Common Grace

Celebrating & Welcoming new members this Sunday!
Remember to sign up for the potluck in the On Tap

Thank you to all who participated in the "Name the Apartments" Contest!

We had nearly 60 name suggestions from Eastmorland neighbors and friends of our project!!
The Common Grace Board loved reading and hearing the thoughtful intentions behind the name suggestions as they worked to make a very hard decision with a lot of tricky considerations involved. We even had to do some legal research into other housing entities with similar names for trademark purposes.

We especially liked the idea of calling the apartments "Commons". We felt that the word denoted the kind of shared space and community life that we intend for these homes in our neighborhood. "Common" is part of our missional statement, "Common Space for the Common Good".

The first name choice was to embrace the shape of the property -- which is notable in the neighborhood -- and go with Jeremy Nealis' suggestion of "Triangle Commons".
However, there is a large housing development that is currently being rebuilt between Regent Street, Park Street and W. Washington Avenue. It is called the "Triangle Community Ministry" or the "Triangle Housing". When doing internet searches including the words "triangle", "housing" and "Madison, WI", this housing development pops up with several links to sites. We felt the strong similarity would lead to constant confusion for the Eastmorland project.

We finally settled on "Grace Commons at Eastmorland" for the name of the apartments. It is a play on the congregational name, but more than that it offers the intention of "courteous goodwill" (which is another definition of "grace") in this place for "common" life in our neighborhood. Courteous goodwill is what we hope our site will continue to create in our neighborhood!

Because this suggestion of Grace Commons ultimately came from our team, we would like to honor the spirit of the contest and award the gift card to the strong runner-up.

Jeremy Nealis -- thank you for suggesting "Triangle Commons" -- please PM us with your contact information so that we might get you the $100 gift card for the local restaurant of your choice or to Woodman's Food Market!

With gratitude to all those who so thoughtfully participated in this contest!

The Common Grace Board