AMENIA — The town of Amenia was humming with holiday excitement on Sunday, Dec. 4, during the town’s 18th annual Holiday of Lights celebration.In the afternoon, children and families flocked to the Amenia Free Library to visit with Santa Claus and get their picture taken with him. The children also received a free book and a candy cane. While waiting in line, everyone chatted cheerfully, munched on homemade baked goods and sipped hot, fresh cinnamon apple cider.Nearby, at the Town Hall, children made ornaments and holiday decorations while a dance class performed select routines in the styles of waltz, foxtrot, hustle and pasodoble. The dance students will be performing their final recital on Sunday, Dec. 11, at 2:30 p.m. at the Webutuck High School auditorium. Admission is free to the public.Free raffle tickets were handed out at both locations. The prizes for the raffles were donated by local businesses, including the Bank of Millbrook, Video Forum, Freshtown and Santo’s Pizza and Pasta.The day’s celebrations were capped with two tree lighting ceremonies, one in Amenia and one in Wassaic.At sunset, merrymakers gathered in Fountain Square for the tree-lighting ceremony. Once the evergreens and the lamp post decorations were illuminated, the crowd sang Christmas carols led by Erica Doyle on vocals and Lizzie Chamberlin on violin.Santa chatted with a few more children before boarding a firetruck adorned with holiday lights and wreaths to make his way to Wassaic.During the tree lighting ceremonies in Amenia and Wassaic, certificates were handed out to the Citizen of the Year in each community. This year, both Citizen of the Year awards went to fire chiefs.The Amenia Citizen of the Year is Shawn Howard and the Wassaic Citizen of the Year is Scott Boardman.Both men were honored for their hard work during the extreme storms that have hit the region during the year, including Tropical Storm Irene and Tropical Storm Lee.Town Supervisor Wayne Euvrard and Councilwoman Vicki Doyle said that there were many people who helped the town in a meaningful way, but these two men stood out because of their dedication and the extreme effort they extended to help their neighbors during states of emergency, often putting the needs of their community above their own.Howard and Boardman will be honored along with previous Citizens on the Year in a display on the second floor of the Amenia Town Hall.Doyle said she hopes to move the display to a more prominent location on the first floor.
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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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