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Baby names

Find baby name inspiration and advice on the Mumsnet Baby Names forum.

Original poster

English/French baby names (living in France)

107 replies

Neelym11 · 30/03/2024 16:25

Looking for some ideas, feedback and inspiration please!

My husband and I are really struggling to agree on a name which works in both English and French. I’m British, he’s French and we’ll be moving permanently to France in a couple of months.

Our son is Arthur which works perfectly in the UK and in France and I don’t mind the difference in pronunciation.

Any suggestions / feedback on the below names would be greatly appreciated.

  • Charlotte (husbands favourite but super popular?)
  • Sylvie (my favourite but apparently very old fashioned in France)
  • Margot
  • Sophie
  • Florence
  • Louis (husband’s favourite after his grandfather.. but again very poplar?)
  • Valentin (my favourite, difficult for English to pronounce?)
  • Théo
  • Rémy
  • Raphaël
  • our surname begins with M if that makes a difference! X
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MissScarletInTheBallroom · 30/03/2024 16:39

Spirallingdownwards · 30/03/2024 16:33

Elodie
Chloe

but I do like all your girl names.

Louis I like but less keen on your others as Thèo will be pronounced Theee-oh here.

What about Beau maybe?

I would really advise against naming your child Beau if you ever plan on spending any time in France.

MissScarletInTheBallroom · 30/03/2024 16:39

Arthur is very popular in France. If you were after an equivalent name you'd want to pick something else that is currently popular.

Bilingual/international names are pretty fashionable at the moment in France, particularly for girls where most of the top 20 is made up of names like Emma, Louise, Alice, Mia, Chloe, Rose etc. Literally just Google the top 100 names in France for 2023 and you'll find loads of them work in English. For boys, Louis, Theo and Raphaël are both good options, maybe also consider Hugo, Leo, Lucas, Oscar, Joseph or Gabriel?

I would advise against Sylvie, it really is dated in France at the moment. Sophie and Florence are also not very commonly used at the moment but both nice names which work well in both languages.

Moonlaserbearwolf · 30/03/2024 16:37

I think Florence is quite old fashioned at the moment in France (someone French can correct me if I’m wrong). Not that that should dissuade you if you like the name.

Spirallingdownwards · 30/03/2024 16:33

Elodie
Chloe

but I do like all your girl names.

Louis I like but less keen on your others as Thèo will be pronounced Theee-oh here.

What about Beau maybe?

oldnorsesaga · 30/03/2024 16:32

Valerian?
Dimitri?
Hugo
Sylvan/Sylvain (for a boy) - but apparently, according to wiki, there have been lots of Sylvain's in 50s
Florian (for a boy) - it's been used in Europe, St Florian is protector of firefighters, mostly been used in countries where names ending in -n would be seen as masculine
Ilyas or Elias

I like Remy.

I like Sophie, Charlotte and Florence... what about Eloise, Elodie, Delphine, Juliette, Alice, Laetitia...

DuchessOfSausage · 30/03/2024 16:31

Charlotte - nice
Sylvie - not keen and old fashioned in France
Margot - too popular in the UK
Sophie - lovely
Florence - ok

Louis - nice
Valentin - will be Val. No
Théo - ok as Tayo but bored with Theo
Rémy - nice
Raphaël - awful. Too many Raffa-yells in my area.

BatshitIsTheOnlyExplanation · 30/03/2024 16:30

There's loads of girls names:
Juliette
Nicole
Jacqueline
Margot
Colette
Amelie

I like all your boys names too