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The Spring Fair at the NEC is the pinnacle of the buying calendar for retailers across the UK. A total of 63,500 buyers attended the show to visit over 3000 exhibitors despite the snow!

Heraldry today

The term "heraldry" often necessitates many people to check their dictionary for the meaning, but evidence of heraldic art is everywhere today. If one takes a moment to reflect many of the coats of arms or heraldic shields seen in the normal course of a day, it becomes quite astounding.

At the moment there are at least 45,000 different surnames in the UK, all with their own significance and meaning, but how did they come about?

The surname ‘system’ came about quite simply because we needed to distinguish between different people of the same Christian name. 

Imagine if we didn’t have surnames now, we’d have to resort to calling people by characteristics or traits, such as ‘Short John’, ‘Big John’, ‘Bald John’, ‘John the Butcher’, ‘John who lives on the Hill’ etc, which is exactly what happened back in Anglo-Saxon times when communities became larger.

Welcome to the Hall of Names Blog. To introduce myself, I began Hall of Names in 2002 with my partner Peter. At the time, I was working in London in a graduate position and jacked it all in on a whim to go out and about selling Hall of Names products. People thought I was absolutely nuts start my own business with zero experience - quite possibly I was but I was determined to prove to everyone it could be done.