Jacob and Emily, Meet Rainier and Columbia

It's easy to find out which baby names are popular. That means it's easy to avoid cliches when you're name-shopping for your infant.

(Congratulations, Jacob and Emily, you've done it again.)

But there's no comparable database of info for companies or other institutions that want to name their spaces. What's the most popular name for a conference room in the Seattle metropolitan area? We couldn't figure that out.

But we came up with three names that probably vie for the top spot, locally:

Rainier. In our time in Seattle, we've worked for several companies, and we're pretty sure all but one had a Rainier Room. The peak obviously dominates local naming consciousness -- we've got a Valley, a Beach, a Way, and a View -- why not half the meeting places in town, to boot?

Columbia. The mighty river may be the big-ass mountain's only real competition in the nomenclature sweepstakes. Mountain vs. river -- why does this strike us as a zen opposition? Gather in the Columbia Room and sweep everyone up in the flow of your mighty waters. (Or is that river full of Kool-Aid?)

Olympic. The dark horse candidate. A smaller mountain, but a name that evokes 2000 years of myth, rather than Grace Kelly's husband. Meet in the Olympic Room and you might just as well be Zeus himself, or at least a god.

Regardless, local room namers are hung up on geography. (We sympathize.)

What are the alternatives? Our sister-in-law used to work in a Portland office where they named all their conference rooms after local bridges -- that seemed like a nice alternative, reasonably conservative while still showing a bit of imagination.

But we don't know what similar efforts are afoot in Seattle. What did your office use for naming inspiration? Are you in the mountain peak rut, or did some crafty individual come up with a more interesting way to direct you to your next meeting?

Contact the author of this article or email tips@seattlest.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By James in Miscellaneous on May 30, 2007 3:41 PM

Comments [rss]

hopey

At the company I work for, the conference rooms on one side of the building are named for inventors (Bell, Einstein, etc.) and the other side are named for famous philosophers.

Nobody can remember where any of the rooms are. "Where is Ada Lovelace again?"

James Callan

Random? Maybe. Awesome? Definitely.

Corey

How's this for random? Our conference rooms are named after things in the movie Zoolander: Blue Steel, Le Tigre, Magnum, Mugatu, etc. My personal favorite: The Center for Kids Who Can't Read Good and Wanna Do Other Stuff Good Too. Wacky!

Jason

Our conference rooms are named for cities where we have other offices, and the streets here in town that this office use to be at. So we could end up meeting with the Cleveland team in the Calgary conference room...

worker drone

The place I work at decided to name their conference rooms after the type of tree growing outside the conference room window...oak, pine, you get the idea.

Besides the fact I think that is one of the lamest ideas they've come up with, the names don't make much sense anymore. The original species of tree outside one has been replaced with another species. Conference room not renamed. A conference room was swapped with an office on the other side of the building. The conference room name now doesn't match the landscape outside. Conference room not renamed.

Jake of 8bitjoystick.com

As a Jacob that grew up next to the Columbia River and now lives in view of the Olympic mountains I ROCK!

Damn it I was teh only damn Jacob in my town and now the name is so trendy.

I get a little paranoid when I am shopping and there is some mom yelling at her son named Jacob.

Cascadia!

Seattle City Hall's meeting rooms are all named for former Seattle leaders who were also important firsts in our history, like Bertha Knight Landes, the first female mayor of a major American city and Norman B. Rice, the first and only African American mayor of Seattle. I think that's a pretty great way to name some conference rooms!