View Message

I like it a lot, and associate it with the kind of beautiful, healthy, blonde, tanned women who - back in the 1950s - would have been photographed on a beach advertising fizzy drinks and dainty, feminine cigarettes!

---

My gripe is that it only shortens to Rina or Reeny.

---

And I wouldn't use it because I far prefer Marinus on a boy.

I loved Marina as a kid and I recently just started crushing on it again.

I want to like it, but it reminds me too much of skating rinks and waterfront parks because...

---

1. I used to live near a place called Marine Park, which is near a marina/harbor/port.
2. It seems a bit Eastern European to me, and my mind adds a K (Marinka) to it.

---

So, while something about it seems like it should be soft/pretty/summery, there's also something hard/salty/crowded about the vibe I get from it, which is an odd contrast for a name to have.

---

I prefer the simplicity of Maria, as well as most other Mar* names.

It used to be one of my favourite, but my DH just thinks of it as a place to dock boats and refuses to consider it as a name! I still like it though.

I want to like Marina. It checks a lot of boxes for me that you've pointed out. Subjectively it just doesn't do it for me.

---

Something about Marina seems so harsh. I met a little girl with this name once and it seemed out of place, or perhaps too grown-up, on her cherubic face. I know this is specific, but in my mind this name belongs on a badass with angular features, and of course not everyone fits that bill.

---

I can understand the appeal but it's just not my style. But, by comparison, I adore both Mara and Marcella.

Opposite to you - the two Marina s I knew when I was younger were both lovely people, but I dislike the name despite that. I love nature names, and names connected with water, but Marina makes me think more of a boatyard, or a mariner. Or alternatively tomato sauce.

---

I prefer Océane

Hi !!

---

The same that you said.
I love its marine meaning.
I used to dislike it because it seemed dated.

---

But in these last years I think that it is a hiddeen gem.
It is poetic and quite melancholy.
(I say it because of the song "La canzone di Marinella" by Fabrizio De André). It is a sad but wonderful ballad.
If you know enough Italian and you like the genre I suggest this singer and songwriter.

---

But it can also be youthful and fresh.
I had a lovely "high school teacher" (but isn't there a word for the high school teacher? In Italian is "professore" the same word for a lecturer) with this name who used to be very sweet and smart.

I think it's very pretty, got a summery feel to it. I have never met one in person though I do know of somebody with a daughter named Marina, who'd be maybe 13 or 14 now.