'An Essential Requirement' The Labor Party's catalogue dubs its sturdy red-and-yellow umbrella "the activist's friend," adding that it is "an essential requirement for wet weather campaigning."

When he walks the hot concrete sidewalk along Canal Street, pushing through air that clings to his skin like cellophane, he hides from the July sun beneath a big, sturdy, black umbrella.

One of my London guidebooks has on its cover the single image of a sturdy wooden-handled umbrella, both a symbol for the city and a reminder to bring one.

Always carry a small, sturdy umbrella.

Readers may want hip boots and a sturdy umbrella.

Instead of rewarding herself with, say, a sturdy umbrella, Ms. Lewin wrote a $60 check to The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund.

The doors still open with metal keys, the primary lighting in the comfortably sized rooms is a chandelier, and the closets hold not only plush robes but sturdy blue umbrellas.

It's lined with dozens of palapas, sturdy, palm-frond thatched umbrellas, each shading two chaise longues.

With those words, Mr. McCollum, 39, who is a marketing director at a real estate agency, exposed a little truth about inclement weather and the city: It takes more than a sturdy umbrella to survive.