[caption id="" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Hudson-Athens Lighthouse, from website."][/caption]Melanie Lekocevic in The Daily Mail reports that the businesses around Athens have a new look since July 1: they are adorned with dozens of lighthouses, mermaids, buried treasure, and other assorted sea creatures. The "Athens Lighthouse Project" is the brainchild of Deputy Mayor Herman Reinhold who wanted to do in Athens a version of the public art projects being done around the region — the cats in Catskill, bears in Cairo and dogs in Hudson, and the Rip van Winkles in Windham, just to name a few. Artists around Athens have been busy creating their own version of the lighthouse, which is a nod to the Hudson-Athens Lighthouse constructed in 1873 on Middle Ground Flats on the Hudson River between the two towns. Read the full story in The Daily Mail. [caption id="" align="alignleft" width="344" caption="A sampling of lighthouses in the Athens Lighthouse Project. You can see close-up photos of each lighthouse at the website (click on image)."][/caption]