by Pamela Redmond Satran 　　One of the search terms that sends a lot of people to Nameberry every day is “pretty girl names.” 　　Are they searching for names that are pretty, we wonder, or names that sound as if they belong to pretty girls?  Or maybe what people are after...

　　by Pamela Redmond Satran and Linda Rosenkrantz 　　Kim Kardashian and Kanye West have reportedly named their newborn daughter North,  and less than 24 hours after the announcement, all directional jokes have officially been cracked. 　　Although that won’t stop anyone from continuing to make them for the rest of little North...

　　The Nameberry 9 by  Abby Sandel of Appellation Mountain 　　Are we becoming more tolerant of creative names? 　　My kids’ friends and classmates are a diverse lot, and their names reflect it. There’s Seamus and Shivarama, a boy named Delaney and a girl called Jordan. Yes, we have Matthew and Sam...

　　See all the girl names on Nameberry here. 　　There’s a new girl in town, and her name is Imogen — the breakout Number 1 among girl names on Nameberry for the first half of 2013. 　　Imogen unseated longtime favorite Charlotte as our most-viewed girl name so far this year.  In...

　　The news this week includes one notably conservative name for a royal baby boy, and several bold names for girls. 　　His Royal Highness Prince George of Cambridge is just a week old.  We’ve discussed his name – and the names the royals didn’t choose, or might be holding in reserve...

　　by Angela Mastrodonato of Upswing Baby Names 　　After years of long-frilly girl names, the winds of fashion are once again shifting and one syllable names are getting recognition. 　　There are several lovely one syllable names with quaint femininity such as Jane, Rose, and Mae. And then there are one syllable...

　　Great girls’ names abound in books, from classic characters like Jane Eyre and Scarlett O’Hara to more contemporary heroines like Matilda and Katniss. 　　So for our Question of the Week, we’d like to know: What are your favorite girls’ literary names? 　　Consult our master list of literary names for girls for inspiration....

　　by Abby Sandel/Appellation Mountain 　　Do you name boys and girls the same way? 　　We often reserve antique gems for girls – lady-like appellations like Charlotte, Amelia, Lydia, and Hattie. But this week, parents proved that retro picks work for boys, too. Several high-profile birth announcements revived grandpa-chic choices for our...

　　by Pamela Redmond Satran 　　It’s a common baby name dilemma: You love a name like Cora or Lila forever, holding it close as your own special secret choice, and then bang!  Right when you’re finally in a position to use it, you discover it’s become a trendy new favorite, vaulting...

　　By Aimee Reneau Tafreshi__ 　　I was at a 1950’s-style diner with my young daughter Addie when an older waitress asked me what the name was short for.   “Adair,” I said, and was shocked when the waitress told me that her grown daughter’s name was also Adair, called “Dare.”   I was impressed...

　　by Linda Rosenkrantz 　　The crystalline clear classic Claire has seen an impressive rise recently—entering the Top 50 for the very first time in 2011—and bringing Cousin Clara and other relatives slip-streaming along with her. The perfect time to take a closer look at this clear-eyed family. 　　CLAIRE—Currently favored spelling Claire...

　　If you like names that are classic and timeless, international and deep-rooted, royal names could be the perfect style for you. 　　These are the names worn by kings, queens, princes, princesses and their families (focussing on European ones here) from early medieval times to the present day — some names...

　　By K. M Sheard of Nook of Names 　　I have been musing about names which, on the surface, appear to be straightforward adoptions of English words, but are, in fact — in origin at least — entirely unrelated. The most popular name of this kind currently in use is Lily. 　　Lily...