Alayah

Alayah shimmers as a modern reworking of Aaliyah, itself rooted in Arabic for exalted or sublime. The spelling softens the double vowels into something that looks, on the page, like the word it suggests, all open skies and slow dawns. The late singer Aaliyah's influence still lingers behind every variation, a soulful, aspirational resonance. Alayah climbed steadily through the 2010s and now sits around 417 in U.S. rankings, a name that feels simultaneously melodic and contemporary. Three liquid syllables, each one lighter than the last. It suits a child whose name will be sung before it is called.