Artistic surprises are hiding everywhere in Fairhope: inside the boutiques, along the bay, down European-style corridors, and now, under rocks.

The rocks are painted on one side with positive messages and are hidden face-down all over the city.

Fairhope resident Lynn McAllister started the project by posting a public invitation on Facebook for a rock-painting event at her house.

“Our mission is very simple,” McAllister wrote in post. “We will work together to paint rocks with encouraging, kind and happy messages and place these rocks around Fairhope for unsuspecting folks to find them … All purely positive people are welcome to be a part of Fairhope Rocks.”

McAllister said she was inspired to start the project after reading about a national rock-painting project called The Kindness Rocks Project. The project began in Cape Cod, Mass. and has spread to over a hundred other locations across the nation, and nine foreign countries.

McAllister said she wanted to start her own project in Fairhope because she “needed a little positivity.

“Honestly, I’ve just been sad about the state of our world and our country,” she said. “I’ve really been feeling lately that love and kindness are the answer to most of the ills.”

Another Fairhope resident who attended the rock-painting event, Martha Miller, said the event was not only about painting rocks, but also about making new friends, since most of the women had not met each other prior to the event.

Fairhope residents have begun to find some of the rocks and have posted their discoveries on the Fairhope Rocks Facebook page. McAllister said a few schools and camps have also contacted her about the project, and that she hopes other Fairhope residents will host their own rock-painting events.

“People in my circles need something positive to focus on,” McAllister said. “What impressed me was how many others want that too.”