Maybe it is the “in” thing for lawn decorations at the moment. A few years ago around here it was the 1/2 whiskey barrels tipped over with flowers spilling out. Then before that it was flower beds, an old metal headboard, footboard, side rails with flowers planted inside, a flower bed.
I still would like to, as the ad said, ruin the neighborhood with some pink flamingos in my yard.
Two people in my neighborhood have them. I’m in a Chicago suburb but well inland so it’s not really a place for nautical/lake themes. Both are surprisingly elaborate affairs constructed within the last year that I saw go in during a daily walk and involved running buried electric from the house to illuminate them. In fact, both times I thought someone was having utility repairs done until a small lighthouse appeared.
They don’t look bad but, as I said, sort of weirdly out of place.
Every lawn ornament mentioned so far in this thread is an improvement over the tacky racist lawn jockeys my mother thinks are cute.
Yeah, I see river buoys and lighthouses.
Excellent !
First time I’ve ever heard of this!
Now isn’t that just a bit redundant?
Explain them in Arkansas.
They’ve moved from the fat lady butt that looks like the lady is bent over weeding her flower bed, with a pokey dot skirt on. Those were truly disgusting.
Truck tire planters are not uncommon in parts of the South. Ingenuity leads to other gardening solutions.
Once in Texas I drove past a rural dwelling that had about a dozen toilet planters lined up in a row. Most impressive.
My in-laws have a sasquatch silhouette which I find amusing.
Woulda been doubly impressive if they’d kept the tanks attached and used those as planters, too.
Very common in Wisconsin, and other Midwestern areas with big Catholic populations. They are DIY shrines to the Virgin Mary, which repurpose an old tub as the “background” for the shrine.
To my eyes, they look one step above having a religious shrine made from a toilet.
Those would be for St. Bonaventure, the patron saint for bowel issues.
I shit you not. 
Lol!
I can’t even…
Nice!
When I was looking for my vintage claw foot tub I wish I had realized where they all were. Color me astounded.
The one I bought was used as a horse trough.
The area my parents lived in went from white working class to 80%+ Hispanic in the last 40 years. First Mexican but now mostly Central American and Venezuelan.
The bathtub grottoes are EVERYWHERE.
It might be a religious christian thing-- “jesus is a lighthouse” etc.
No doubt many of these are hiding wells. Lots of wells have a pipe about 6" or 8" in diameter sticking up out of the lawn 2’ or so. Hollow objects in that size range hide them. The issue changes from “why have a lighthouse on your lawn” to “which lawn decoration are we going to pick”. We have a fiberglass fake boulder; YMMV.
What is a “well” in this context?
All the places I’ve seen these things are ordinary suburban houses with city water and city sewer. Of course that’s because I’ve always lived in such areas. And nobody nearby had struck oil.
The one time I lived where we and all our neighbors had city water but septic systems, the septic access cover was a low dome about 18-24" in diameter; no way any of the lighthouses I saw around there were hiding that.
He did emphasize that emanationism was a core principle of theology. 