It’s one thing consulting lists of the most popular baby names of 2018 to ensure you are en vogue when naming your soon-to-arrive bundle of joy, but at Dom & Geri we also like to be a trendsetter. This might mean being truly original in an abstract and not-always-socially-acceptable way, or it could mean adopting a bit more left-of-centre thinking in order to be different and stand out from the crowd.
There’s a fine line between being adventurous and challenging with a creative baby name and subjecting your child to a lifetime of being pointed at in the playground and/or the works canteen, which is why many people scour the varying trends of baby names over the years for those charming forgotten names that might just be the next retro phenomenon to become uber chic.
Retro baby names back in fashion
Like fashions, colours and interior design patterns, baby names tend to work on a cyclical pattern whereby old becomes new and vintage becomes cool. Names like Olivia, Ava, Noah and Lucas currently sit in the top ten baby names for girls and boys having made a leap back into popularity in recent years. Meanwhile names like Ella and Grace have retained popularity due to our widespread penchant for Victorian classic styles, and names such as Elizabeth, Emma, James and John will seemingly forever have a timeless quality.
Of course fashions change so fast and there is very much an ‘anything goes’ mentality today, so it’s hard to know if fashions are making a comeback a second time around, someone is hopelessly out of date or if they are an ironic hipster right on the cutting edge. But if we’re talking about cyclical patterns, it appears some baby names are on a bigger cycle than others and are taking quite some time to come back round into fashion, so much so that they have essentially become forgotten.
Forgotten baby names from over 100 years ago
Popular parenting website Babycenter recently published lists of the ten girls and boys names that had held high positions in the popularity stakes in 1880 but had endured a sizeable dip since then. Some of these we only know as being popularised by film characters or sports stars decades ago, and we’ve never actually met one, but here are the official most forgotten baby names:
Boys:
Harry
Otto
Luther
Alfred
Francis
Lee
Rufus
Julius
Frederick
Stuart
Girls:
Alma
Hattie
Flora
Rosa
Ira
Ada
Minnie
Ida
Nellie
Maude
Some of these names regained fleeting popularity around the 1970s, never mind the 1880s, but have somehow been forgotten in recent years. Likewise, you will rarely meet anyone younger than 40 that is called Graham, Tony, Ray or Terry or for the ladies Tracy, Sharon, Yvonne or Diane. And it would make an interesting office sweepstake to predict which decade any of those next appeared in the top 10 most popular baby names, although there’s every chance the winner wouldn’t be alive to collect their winnings.
We want to hear your uncommon baby names
Names undoubtedly seem to fit with the times, but at Dom & Geri we are really keen to see some forgotten names regain their rightful place back at the top table. So if you already have a child between the ages of 0-5 years with one of the above forgotten baby names then we salute you! And to recognise the originality, bold thinking and creative flair that we fully embrace and welcome at Dom & Geri, we are happy to reward you with a FREE personalised card, wrapping paper and party banner package! Simply get in touch with us and let us know your uncommon name!