After a combined 80 minutes of public comment periods in which some members of the public spent time arguing back about issues unrelated to the agenda, members of the Winchester Board of Selectmen may finally be fed up enough to lay some ground rules for audience members during their regular meetings.The Monday, March 4, selectmen’s meeting featured a number of the town’s usual pontificators taking the microphone to launch into diatribes and complaints. The meeting eventually devolved into a mudslinging match between residents who repeatedly abused the public comment period. Town Manager Dale Martin called it one of the most unproductive displays he has seen since he came to town. Thirty minutes of actual business was conducted amid the nearly hour and a half of mostly complaining and bickering.Members of the Board of Selectmen are right to look into setting rules for public comment, and the board has already received correspondence from Town Attorney Kevin Nelligan with suggestions on how to form a comments policy. There is no law that says the board must have a public comments section during its meetings, but townspeople agree that the comments period is important. Selectmen have generally welcomed public input as a courtesy to constituents.Unfortunately, some of the town’s most long-winded malcontents invariably end up at the microphone, spewing off-topic rhetoric and airing their personal dirty laundry, as they did Monday night. The regular appearance of certain people, who only come to complain, is an embarrassment to the town. These speakers are generally uninformed and don’t take any time to discuss matters with board members before launching into personal attacks.The majority of the public comments portion of Monday night’s selectmen’s meeting was useless banter. Some general rules about avoiding belaboring the point and staying on topic might have reduced the amount of wasted time. Stronger use of the gavel by Mayor Maryann Welcome might also come in handy. One would hope certain residents would use common sense and courtesy when speaking in front of their neighbors, but that hope is regularly dashed.Winchester residents have numerous, well-known venues to announce their opinions. Selectmen’s meetings are not an appropriate place for prolonged public debate and these meetings should not be overtaken by the town’s political agitators.
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Greg Fricke and James Boehmer, co-owners of Peggy Mercury in Kent, recently launched their first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts.”
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Fricke and Boehmer are not there to stock their shelves with the same products customers find at standard makeup retailers. They’re there to help customers find what works for them. That usually means asking customers about themselves and learning about their beauty habits, skin, style and the way they like to present themselves. Fricke and Boehmer believe it’s their job to help customers bring out the qualities that suit them and determine what works best for their look.
So much of the Peggy Mercury world is about emboldening people to become more creative, and possibly bolder, versions of themselves. Some of this comes through the store’s creative collaborations with artists, designers and stylists.
It’s part of an ethos that encourages them and their friends to use the shop as a kind of laboratory, trying out new creative experiments without knowing how they might turn out. Whether in fashion, painting, fiber arts or photography, the projects almost always turn out marvelously.
A line of sterling silver charms they sell started as a small project by their friend Nolan Percival. In the beginning, the pieces were for close friends and loved ones. But Boehmer and Fricke encouraged Percival to get a little more serious about the project and create a whole line for the store. Today, it’s one of their top-selling collections.
Classic styles, bold colors, and creative concerts make up the “Imaginary Concerts” line at Peggy Mercury.Provided
“Imaginary Concerts” has the duo taking their own advice.
The project started as a way for Boehmer to connect with his mother, who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Taking old concert shirts from his own collection, Boehmer and his mother began cutting out the graphics with the idea that they would make a quilt together. Unfortunately, she died before they could complete the project in 2025. The pieces, which were ready for production, were put on the back burner as Boehmer and Fricke dealt with their loss and the whirlwind of projects that never seemed to cease at Peggy Mercury.
But the harsh winter of 2026 presented an opportunity to take some time and focus on themselves. Part of that meant revisiting and redefining the concert T-shirt project. This time, instead of looking to the warmth and comfort of a quilt, they turned to another passion — fashion.
Taking a page from their own book, they wanted to create something that felt comfortable to them. They took two disparate loves — one rooted in simple preppy style, with clean lines and classic silhouettes, and the other in the nitty gritty worlds of punk rock and pop — and blended them together to create something entirely new. Pulling from the staples of vintage Brooks Brothers and Charvet collections, they applied the graphic elements with bold stitching reminiscent of punk jackets of the ‘70s and ‘80s, but with a much more sophisticated air.
But the remixing isn’t just the pairing of prep and punk. The pieces are not canon. They take liberties with the realities of concert tours, combining one band’s dates with another band’s logos, mixing them all up until the reality is lost and imagination is the only truth.
Shirts from Peggy Mercury’s first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts,” hang on display.Provided
Adding to the mix is an element of perpetual creativity. Art can be messy, both figuratively and literally, and many of Fricke and Boehmer’s artist friends carry evidence of their work on them at all times. As a nod to these tireless creatives, the duo added haphazard splashes of bright color, giving the line an even more distinctive feel.
For them, “Imaginary Concerts” passes the “Peggy Test.” The mythical Peggy Mercury is a fictional figurehead for the company, a character who thrives on creativity and change. The name, much like the clothing line, is a mixture of interests: Mercury is a planet, a deity and an elusive, transformative element, while Peggy is the wonderfully stylish and boundary-pushing Peggy Guggenheim.
Everything Fricke and Boehmer put in their store has to pass this test: Would Peggy Mercury approve? For their first collection, the answer is a resounding yes.
Peggy Mercury is at 9 Maple St., Unit 2, Kent.
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