Those porcelain Victorian ladies might have had it right all along. They never left the house without their silk or lace parasol. Bronze skin? Sun-kissed glow? Freckles? Forget it. Their alabaster beauty was the standard, a look that said "I'm wealthy. I'm a lady. I don't have to work outside."

Today, protecting the skin isn't about wealth. It's about health. Healthy skin, in any skin tone, is increasingly harder to achieve these days, with the sun more damaging than ever and the growing controversy that some sunscreens may not be as effective as we've been led to believe.

In this modern new world, can an updated version of the old-fashioned parasol make a comeback?

"It just makes sense to me," says Kat Nichols, 33, who was recently at her boyfriend's softball game in Raleigh hiding under a white-and-blue-striped sun umbrella. "I want to be outside, but I don't want to get too much sun, especially when it's so hot like this."

Dr. Eric Challgren of The Dermatology and Skin Cancer Center in Raleigh says style plays a big part of how people are willing to cover up. Women typically don't like wearing baseball caps or a brimmed hats, despite being outside in the sun. It ruins their hair and makes them sweat. But kids these days are increasingly covering up at the beach with trendy Rash Guard surfer shirts, once just popular in Australia.

"I think anything's possible when it comes to a new style for sun protection," Challgren says.

By today's standards, though, the parasol is hardly chic. Most people think of white-powdered geishas or Floridian geriatrics with parasols or sun umbrellas.

Yet parasols have a proven track record as one of the most stylish accessories in history. The Egyptians were the first to use them to protect the skin from the sun in 3000 B.C., a look that was picked up by ancient Romans and Greeks, and eventually passed along to 17th-century Europeans and early Americans.

They were once so popular in North Carolina, the N.C. Museum of History has a collection of 34 antique parasols -- most of them made of black silk, including one still in its wooden box from Tiffany, says Louise Benner, the museum's curator of costume and textiles.

The parasol died in America and Europe when the suntan started taking over in the 1920s.

Not just an umbrella

And who could blame anyone for ditching her parasol, especially as life became more complicated? Imagine getting in and out of the car to do errands after work, juggling the groceries and dry cleaning while trying to dig a ringing cell phone out of your oversized, overstuffed handbag? Who wants to be responsible for anything else?

For one, Raleigh's Cary Edgar. This week, after plenty of searching for just the right one, Edgar, 28, ordered a sun umbrella from GustBuster with a silver exterior and a dark interior, which is supposed to give a cooling effect underneath it.

"It looks pretty space-agey, but I'm sure that it'll do the trick," she says. "We 'church of sunscreen' freaks are always looking for new ways to stay pasty, especially given the recent scorching temperatures."

Unlike rain umbrellas, these modern sun umbrellas like the one Edgar ordered are typically made with special protective fabrics that reflect sun rays. Sure, an umbrella will block some of the sun, but if you hold up the umbrella and can see rays of light, it's not going to be as effective for sun protection as a sun umbrella.

Szanne Perry, a licensed esthetician in Southern California and owner of Deveta.com, which sells parasols lined with a UV fabric, says she's already seeing the trend happening. Parasol sales at her six-year-old, Las Vegas-based Web site have doubled in the last few years as the number of skin cancer cases have jumped.

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