Tobi made a comment yesterday that has had my mind racing ever since - he wondered whether we could create a more ownable name that rather triggered curiosity. He said he really liked Moomah because other than just sounding cosy and cool, noone else could be possibly confused with it and it is a really strong brand name - he's got a point ...
So names that spark curiosity - I had two possible approaches:
1. Did Easton or Quin have any weird words for things that are no where near the real word? Elias says Boose for Spoon - however much we try and pronounce Spoon clearly to him he repeats it back as Boose - I thought if Easton or Quin had a similar one (especially if eating or food related but could be something totally different to add a surreal element) then the 2 nonsensical words could come together - e.g.
Woo Woo and Boose - it might even have that quite nice tone of 2 surnames together ala Melrose and Morgan?
2. Alternatively we find really unusual words that actually exist in the English language but most adults and children would not have heard of them and create something quite 'curious' that way - I went through my book of Philavery (unusual words) last night - these words I found quite funny:
Abada - Rhino
Angelet - A coin worth Half an Angle (old money)
Beek - To warm and make comfortable
Bavardage - Idle chatter
Bungo - a canoe
Biggin - a child's bonnet and a coffee pot
Gallimaufry - a jumble, a hodge-podge, a ridiculous medley
Gamp - an umbrella
Grimoire - a book of magic from the middle ages
Inchoate - at the initial point or early stages of development
Jorum - a large drinking bowl
Kinker - a circus perormer
Moodle - to mooch and meander aimlessly, to pass time doing nothing
Nipperkin - a small drinking cup (1/8 of a pint), a measure of wine or beer, any small quantity
Prink - to dress up, smarten, preen
Quiddity - the essence of something, what differentiates it.
Tantivy - a fast gallop
Whangdoodle - an imaginery creature which features in north american folklore (but Roald Dahl has used them in his books too)
Yaffle - to eat and drink (esp. noisily or greedily)
Zegedine - a silver drinking cup
Zoonist - someone who believes that natural objects are living beings
I quite like mixing some of them up - e.g.
Beek and Biggin
or I'm partial to the drinking vessels:
Nipperkin and Zegedine
Might all be a bit 'try-hard' and I still really like curiosity Cafe.
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I completely agree with you on the name. LOVE your ideas.
ReplyDeleteI spoke with Michael on Friday night about the name and he said it really should be unique to us (there was already a 'curiosity cafe' when we looked it up, and although it looked gross, we still don't want to be in the same sort of category). Also, I think it's really essential that we have a .com address. Straight forward and easy to remember. For example, we don't want to call ourselves curiosity cafe and then have our site be called curiositycafe.net (too confusing). I really like Moomah because it is a cool sounding word, simple and easy to say, and they have the .com URL. (Which doesn't sound too important now, but I think it really is.)
My comments on your cool suggestions above...
I think they should be easy to remember and easy to spell, so people can easily look us up and find our website. 'nipperkin and zegedine' is kind of too hard to say, and I think it will be too difficult to remember. Where 'Beek and Biggin' is much easier.
Though I have to say, I like 'boose' A LOT!
Just a thought -- if we do a two word name like "Beek and Biggin" are we too much like "Maggie and Rose"?
ReplyDeleteI agree on the 'not too complicated' point - also we want kids to be able to say the name.
ReplyDeleteAlso on the Maggie and Rose point - I thought the same - there are a lot of companies that seem to do the 2 name thing - Elias and Grace, Johnny Loves Rosie, Maggie and Rose etc etc.
I like Boose too - just because it has a silliness to it.