by giving the umbrella a future ambition it is given an afterlife. effectively prolonging the lifespan of the umbrella the afterlife is a compact easily demountable hemispherical shelter. potentially suitable for disaster relief/refugee applications.

to produce the hemisphere ten six sided umbrellas are fixed to 6 pentagonal fabric panels. for the purpose of the protype the pieces are all fixed together with cable ties, however by including the desire for all six sided umbrellas to have a uniform type of connection such as a zip, sealstrip or velcro/hook/loop fixing along all six sides. the umbrellas can be converted into shelters more easily

predomanantly the umbrellas must be functioning, however they can be patched up and scrappy as they could be given a service by competent personel. the drawback of the prototype is it's low resistance to lateral wind. however this can be improved by conecting the handles on the inside together with cable. effectively improving its structural performance.

by embracing the afterlife,the umbrella manufacturers will expand their market exponentially. especially if thier customers donate their used umbrellas to humanitarian organizations in order to upgrade to a less tired model. and lost property organizations are pursuaded to pass the umbrellas onto the humanitarian organizations too.

they also alow groups of people to come togher and merge their umbrellas into a more effective shelter in say a filthy storm.

This prototype was assembled using 900mm diameter umbrellas a larger more comfortable shelter could be formed with 1500mm diameter umbrellas.

Apologies to the world and her diminishing resources for testing the idea with new umbrellas… however I did try sourcing them from charity shops in the first instance, and didn't find six sided umbrellas. Also for the first attempt I thought it would help if they were all the same size. I have kept the receipt and was given 28 days to return, although it would be a bit of a shame to destroy the only prototype so I think I will make my return decision nearer the end of the 28 days.

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