When I was a child all the houses in our road had names. I think it’s a pity very few do now. In nostalgic mood I went back to look at the road not long ago, and almost all the gates with the names on had been removed in order to widen the drives to accommodate bigger cars. Such a shame. I lived in two houses with names: Newthorpe and The Beeches - it had copper beech trees in the front garden.
Since I’ve grown up I haven’t had a house with a name, but both my brother and my elder son have houses that already had names when they bought them. Neither house has a number, which must be hard for the postman and delivery people.
I think if you gave an ordinary surburban house a name now you would be considered pretentious, which is a bit silly. Why? It’s a nice imaginative thing to do, and gives the house some individuality. I had a secret name for the house I lived in most of my adult life, but I think if I’d put it on the gate the neighbours would have thought it very strange. Since most of the houses in that road were quite old, I think it’s likely they had names originally.
(Mind you, some of the names could be a bit over-ambitious. I once saw a very ordinary semi called Balmoral.)