Lily

The lily has meant purity in Western iconography since medieval annunciation panels, where the angel arrives with a white stalk in hand — and the name carries some of that quiet, devotional light. It comes straight from the flower, by way of the Latin lilium. For a long time Lily was a nickname people grew out of; then Lily Allen, Lily Collins, and Lily Tomlin all kept it current, and parents realized it was too good to tuck inside a longer name. It has lived in the American top thirty for two decades. Two soft syllables, all l's and i's, a name that sounds exactly like its shape. Floral, gentle, and quietly luminous.