April Showers Bring Fancy Umbrellas

Theoretically, we would all get along a lot better if we eschewed our umbrellas for simple (and aerodynamic) rain hats. Gothamist hates the umbrella poke in the eye and the slippery umbrella puddles left in entrances and hallways. Some days, however, you just gotta stay dry and you just need to join the pokey, puddly, umbrella sporting masses, always bearing in mind your umbrella etiquette of course! Streets flooded with black umbrellas could only mean one thing – we have survived another long, cold winter and now it's April. Although the black umbrella is tried and true, Gothamist turns its head when someone carrying an umbrella with a little color and style crosses our path. We decided to see if we could find some eye-catching designs that would pop against a sea of black Totes. At first, it was a rather disappointing pursuit. After weeding out plain monochromatic designs we were left with the following designs: impressionist paintings, puppies, kittens, and/or cartoon characters.

Ok, so this was not going to be as easy as we thought. Lucky for us a company called Tray6 shares our vision and offers stylish umbrellas for those wanting to add a little color to a dreary gray day. Gothamist likes the Perch Crimson and Garden Magenta travel umbrellas. MoMA design store also offers a few colorful options, our favorite is the Two-Toned Umbrella, offered in three different color combinations. Pare umbrella boast unique, fun designs. Check out the Mushroom Paradise in orange and Sweety in pink. We like all these designs but we also know that we have seen other ones out there on the streets. Gothamist would like to see what you’ve got.

And if you are still not sold on the idea, maybe try sporting any color other than black this spring – so we will at least see you coming.

Abandoned brolly from hugovk's flickr stream.