Awesome Finnish Names

Laura is a hauntingly evocative perennial, never trendy, never dated, feminine without being fussy, with literary links stretching back to Dante. All this makes Laura a more solid choice than any of its more decorative counterparts and one of the most classic girl names starting with L.

While traditionally pronounced as a homonym for Lee, Glee actress Lea Michele pronounces her name like Leah, and it may also rhyme with Freya. Regardless of your preferred pronunciation, it's interesting to note that Lea has always charted in the US Top 1000, despite coming close to the bottom a few times, making it one of the girl names starting with L that both fits in and stands out.

Leena is the form of Lena found in Finland and Estonia. It sits just outside the Top 1000 in the US, where it may be used as a Lena alternative that avoids pronunciation confusion.

Leo is a strong-yet-friendly name that was common among the Romans, used for thirteen popes, and is now at its highest point ever in the US thanks in part to Leonardo "Leo" DiCaprio.

Cute and quirky Lily alternative.

This nickname-name is very popular in Germany, though Lottie is still the preferred version in the US. The problem, of course, is that you'll have to put up with a lotta jokes. See?

A lovely and typical name on the eastern shore of the Gulf of Bothnia that no one in the English-speaking world will know how to pronounce. Maia sounds (virtually) the same and is far more familiar outside Finland and Latvia.

Mari enjoyed some mid-century popularity as a nicknameish version of Mary, but now deserves a second look as a multicultural classic. Mari is the name of the Basque goddess of fertility and weather and is also, for unrelated reasons, popular in Norway. The biggest problem with the potentially-lovely Mari will be getting people to say it the way you want. While some Europeans pronounce it as Marie, that will only confuse things more. Better to make it its own individual name by pronouncing it MAH-ree. As one commenter pointed out, in Estonian the name is not a Mary variation but means "berry" – all the more reason for us to like it!

A midcentury Catholic classic that's not chosen by many parents today. Leonard Cohen fans might think of the beautiful song So Long, Marianne, named for his lover and muse Marianne Ihlen.

Marko is one of the many names derived from Mars, the god of war. Marco is the more usual Spanish form but Marko is a variation used in Spain along with Russia, Ukraine, and several Slavic countries.

The K may be trendy, but this spelling variation is much less popular than Marcus.

The single T version of Matias is, like Mateo, the Spanish variation of the Hebrew Biblical Matthias or Matthew, while the double T version as in Mattias and Matteo is usually Italian.