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Visual Art & Design

House Proud

In this week’s “Tell Me,” Tablet Magazine’s illustrated question-and-answer column, we consider the names people give to their domiciles and meet a particularly dovish homeowner

By Liana Finck|May 9, 2011 7:00 AM|12comments
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Tell Me

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Liana Finck is a poet and graphic novelist.
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  • http://metaphorager.net Neal Ross Attinson

    Muchtouching Manor. (It’s a happily married thing.)

  • Therry Neilsen-Steinhardt

    Suntrap. It’s a passive solar house.

  • Malachi

    Monkey Haus: owing to the repairs I’m making from the last occupants.

  • Steve Stein

    Strange – I have often contemplated this recently, and I have no answer as yet.
    But Malachi gets a prize for the best welcome sign! (If it doesn’t violate copyright!)

  • http://url Richard M. Cohen

    My mom, Bernice Flaum Cohen, named our house in Mountaindale, NY -”Azey Villa.” Years before she and my dad, Gilbert M. Cohen, attended the 25th Wedding Anniversary of my dad’s uncle and aunt, Max and Sylvia (Loventhal) Lazansky, (my grandmother, Ida Bessie Lazinsky Cohen’s brother and sister-in-law) in Long Branch, NJ. There, on the front porch, was the sign that read “Azey Villa.” (‘As I like it…’)

  • http://url Richard M. Cohen

    Forgot to mention that my cousins, Beth (Rosen) and Steven Seavey of Eatontown, NJ, had a sign made up that said “Azey Villa” as a gift for my parent’s 35th wedding anniversary. It graced the front porch of our house until we moved to Florida. I now have it among my cherished possessions.

  • Meredith

    Our house already has a name – the Villa Thuringa, dubbed as such by German emigrees in the 1910s.

  • Sacha

    The Ridge – because it’s on top of a….

  • Eliraz Si-Gova

    I think my grandmother used to call her house the “It’s not such a mansion like your friends the Schwartzes have but vus ken men tun, it’s a nice house all the same thank you very much and please take off your shoes” house.

    House names are strange. I think they should eschew puns. That is a dangerous game. If you had a house without a roof, would you call it the “Dew Drop In?”

    Houses could be named for the way they smell. So, the Lavender and Smoke House. A funny house name for a vegetarian…

  • http://harrietfinck.com Anna

    recently stayed in a sad little cabin on the Cape Cod shore, part of a group, all with quaint sandy names like Sea Urchin, and Periwinkle.

  • debra

    Interesting thought…we looked for a name for our cottage a while back but never found anything satisfying… so it is still nameless… for now!
    In the Findhorn park and college… everything has a name… from the houses, the bathrooms (lavender and sea urchin were likely among those… with appropriate decor and accessories) to the washing machines and all appliances to the cars… kind of cool…

  • G

    Dumpy Brown! because, well, it’s a dumpy brown house… sometimes just Dumpy B, or the Dumpster, or just plain Dumpy.

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House Proud

In this week’s “Tell Me,” Tablet Magazine’s illustrated question-and-answer column, we consider the names people give to their domiciles and meet a particularly dovish homeowner