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Fincastle BearsThe naming of bears is a difficult matter
It isn't just one of your holiday games.
At first you may think I'm as mad as a hatter
When I tell you a bear must have a REALLY GREAT name.
Ok, Ok, I've had my fun. Sorry about that. 
I'm very new to bear making and my days of doing first shows and putting first bears on the market are yet to come, but I do have some small experience in selling crafts and branding yourself. To that end, I'd really like to settle on a name early in the game just to make things easier down the line.
I wanted to name my bears something that reflected my family home back in America, particularly the utterly gorgeous ginkgo trees that lined both sides of the street.
I thought about going with the name "Ginkgo Bearies." I thought it was cute, though I know I am far from the first person in the world to pun on the words bear and berry. However, most people I pitched it to immediately pointed out the stinkiness of ginkgo berries. Perhaps that particular stench is softened for me by childhood memories.
My alternate plan and the name I am currently working with is the name of the street, Fincastle. (Amusingly that is not the street with the ginkgos as the house was on a corner, but that's splitting hairs.) I keep calling them Ginkgo Bearies in my head, though.
Regardless of the way I go, a ginkgo leaf will play a part in my "signature." I'm still debating how to mark my bears but I KNOW it will be included in some way. They are very beautiful leaves and quite distinctive.
So, bottom line: can "Ginkgo Bearies" overcome stinky connotations by being cute?
Or is "Fincastle Bears" the way to go?
I appreciate any opinions. I hesitated to post as this is just me, personally, being indecisive and not anything to aid the bear making world in general, but I am just dying to have an opinion or two from folks in the industry as it were.
GermanyOh yes, I know the problem. The name must be unique. There may not be him already, because of mistakes..... :wacko:
I have visited your Blog. Nice! 
Fincastle BearsHmmm, does that mean that 'Bearies' is a problem? I did google "Ginkgo Bearies." It didn't occur to me that "Bearies" in and of itself might be problematic because berry/bear is a relatively common pun but I could very easily be wrong about that.
I guess maybe I could just split the difference and do "Ginkgo Bears."
Edit: Thank you! My blog is SO very much a "work in progress."
GermanyI mean, there may not be the "brand"....
The beginning is made.
Would you want follower?
Fincastle BearsSure, Conni! I would love one. I also hope to write my blog also in German in the future. Ich kann ziemlich gut auf Deutsch reden aber nicht so besonderes gut schreiben. 
I will follow you, too!
Germany Thank you! My english is not so good.
My blog has an translator.
PennsylvaniaThe common name for ginkgo biloba is "maidenhair."
"Maiden-Bears?" 
Also, there is the play on words: "Ginkgo-Bear-Loba" or "Ginkgo-Bear-Lover."
P.S. T.S. Eliot smiles at you!
Any word can be misspelled, of course, but "ginkgo" is definitely tricky. (Could be a problem when people are looking for you online?)
I do love the way the leaves look. (And didn't know that the berries are stinky.)
Becky
PennsylvaniaGinkgo berries contain butyric acid which smells like rancid butter. However, if you remove the smelly flesh, the little nut or seed inside is edible. Ginkgo seeds are somewhat popular in Asia.
Ginkgo trees are dioecious. That means that there are male and female ginkgo trees, the same as holly. If there isn't a male tree nearby to pollinate a female tree it won't grow berries. Because the ginkgo berries are so smelly, most public parks and places that plant ginkgo trees will only plant male trees. That way, people won't be exposed to the smelly berries. This is probably the reason why most people don't know that ginkgo trees grow berries. They've never seen (or smelled) them.
As to naming, remember that the second part of the ginkgo's taxonomic name, "biloba," refers to the tree's leaves that have a distinct two-part shape. "Biloba" is Latin for "two lobes." ("Bi" = two or twin. "loba" = part or lobe. "Bi" + "loba" = "two-lobes.")
Maybe you can use some of this info to help you use word play and alternate meanings to decide on a name.
Us Bears still like "Ginkgo Bear-Lover."
Say it with a New York City accent. ("Ginkgo Beah-lovah!" )
Fincastle BearsThank you all so much for the input!
Yes, those female trees are very stinky. The reason I can't name the bears after the street the ginkgos were actually on is that it is "Catalpa St." They intended to plant catalpa trees but a mistake was made and the whole block was lined with female ginkgos. By the time I was born they were huge and very productive. We were VERY popular with parts of the Asian community who did regularly come to gather our stinky harvest. For me the smell was just another part of autumn, just like the waxy, golden leaves.
So what I think I'm getting overall that Ginkgo Bears isn't really hitting it out of the park for people for one reason or another- but by the same token the ginkgo connection is more interesting than just going straight to "Fincastle Bears." I mean Fincastle IS a neat name but it doesn't really have much to do with the connection I'm trying to make, and it's not all that catchy.
I think I'm going to keep working on it. I had some vaguely similar ideas to you, Us Bears, in the sense that I tried several ways of alluding to the trees or the leaves instead of just using the term "Ginkgo." I think I'm going to continue down that same line of thought and see what I can come up with.
Two Leaf Bears
Wax Leaf Bears
Golden Leaf Bears
Twin Leaf Bears
I even thought of Memory Bears alluding to the memory boosting properties of ginkgo and punning on the fact that I am trying to name my bear Making endeavors for childhood memories. I need to google that one though because it seems likely someone's gotten there first.
Past Time BearsCould you put a ginkgo leaf as a charm on each of your bears? Or embroider a leaf on one of the foot pads? The leaf would become a symbol of your bears apart from whatever name they go by. You can make the leaves yourself with paper clay or a fimo type clay - or use the shrink plastic product. There are also many 'altered art' methods that would work, too.
Fincastle BearsHaha! Oh my gosh it is so funny you should say that about the polymer clay, Sue Ann. It just hit me a few minutes ago I could do it that way, and I was JUST this minute digging through my little fimo stash to see if I had the colors I needed or would need to pick some up (I'll have to get some- I mostly only have teeth/nose colors from my needle felted sculpting.)
I do like the idea of the charms. You can find ginkgo leaf charms wholesale but IMO it's more fun when thing are made.
My first idea was to make a needle felting "cookie cutter" and needle felt a leaf onto the bottom or thigh of every bear in a complementary color to the fabric. I am going to test run both routes and see which I like most. I have needle felted using a cardboard cut-out stencil before but never on so small a scale and never on mohair so I need to see how it goes.
Past Time BearsThose sound like great ideas!
I had a hard time coming up with my name too, in the end all the names i chose seemed to be taken, so i went back to the name of my village and used that.
Maybe you could play with parts of names and put them together like Ginkbeary Bears or something? I thought Fincastle Bears sounded fine though
Memory bears are often made out of clothing from a loved one who has passed or similar, so maybe the association of that is not what you would want?
I think whatever you choose will be something that just feels 'right' in the end
PennsylvaniaThe problem with naming Bears is that you don't often tell a Bear what his name is. He usually tells you. Sometimes he takes his good, old, sweet time to tell you.
As we think about names, we have decided that the first syllable in "ginkgo" doesn't sound very nice. It sounds too much like the slang word, "Gink," which means "foolish or contemptible."
Us Bears like "Fincastle" better. What Bear wouldn't love to live in a castle! :cool:
We also like the idea of putting a ginkgo leaf in the background.
Like this:
Not saying you should do this exact thing. Just an idea for brainstorming.
Feel free to like, not like or modify.
We just think it's easier to decide on things if you can visualize the idea.
Fincastle BearsJenbee, I saw that about Memory Bears! I hadn't expected that to be the use of the word, but it sure does make sense. It's a very nice idea, really. Maybe I should offer to make my mother-in-law one. Her mother just passed away last month.
Us Bears, I love that logo idea! With your permission I'd love to give it to my husband as a guide. He's a graphic designer and promised to make me a logo, but this is so much more specific than me just saying "Do something with a ginkgo leaf" which was as far as I'd gotten on my own. I'm actually trying to make a ginkgo leaf background for my blog and it's... amusing. I'll be doing a lot of baking. My husband and I have an art-for-cake agreement. He makes the art, I make the cake.
Incidentally, I agree about the "sound" of ginkgo. My sister and I were talking about it last night and we both decided that ginkgos are so much prettier than their name! We brainstormed together trying to come up with one word descriptions of the "feeling" of ginkgo leaves which was fun, but I still didn't find a name that really struck me to the core. I think at this point that unless something pops up along the ____ Leaf lines, I'll just stick with the Fincastle Bears. It's not perfect but it's a conversation piece!
What REALLY makes me happy and encourages me is the positive reception that the ginkgo leaf as emblem/tag/logo/button has received here. I guess maybe my bears just prefer to be labeled more visually rather than verbally!
