Bill Boon, professor in landscape architecture, has a knack for the wacky when it comes to projects for his Design 129 class.

There was the year the Rolling Stones came to town, and Boon had students mark the occasion by designing an apparatus to roll down a hill — with a student inside. And then there was the time he had students construct a “flinger” to hurl water balloons at their professor. And there was the project dubbed “Jesus Shoes,” in which students had to walk across Lake Laverne.

Boon’s latest assignment, “The Ides of September,” sounds like a project for the birds: Each of the 350 students taking Design 129 this semester were asked to design a scarecrow for display on central campus.

On Thursday afternoon, decked out in a leather vest and hat a la “Crocodile Dundee,” Boon watched his students bring their creations to life, canvassing the grassy area near the Campanile with their work.

“What we’re doing is not necessarily based on the traditional image of the scarecrow,” he said. “The students were asked to develop a theme and then create a scarecrow based on that.”

Each section of the class came up with their own themes, including cartoon characters, a pool party, zombies, a football game and a ’70s theme featuring the Village People.

Some well-known characters represented in the display include Marge and Homer Simpson, Tinky Winky the Teletubby, Popeye, Tigger, Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig and a host of other cultural icons.

Boon came up with the idea after hearing a botanist from Mississippi speak on scarecrows as an art form.

“In some southern areas, scarecrows are sort of a vernacular art,” he said. “It’s one of the ways they’ll decorate their property.”

Sharon Kemmerer and Anna Morphew, both sophomores in elementary education, teamed up to create Marge and Homer Simpson.

“Our section chose a cartoon theme, and ‘The Simpsons’ is our favorite show. That’s why we chose Marge and Homer,” Kemmerer said. “We shopped an hour or two for material and spent around four hours making them.”

Jason Carlson and Robert Rock, both sophomores in pre-landscape architecture, designed Tarzan and Jane scarecrows for the display.

“We just wanted to hang something from a tree,” Carlson said. “So this is what we came up with.”

Design 129 is open to all majors, and students cited different reasons for enrolling in the class.

“Being an elementary education major, you need to be creative for the work you’ll be doing with kids,” Morphew said. “This class emphasizes different ways of being creative.”

J.T. Williams, junior in graphic design, said that he took the class because it sounded like a lot of fun.

“I take all the fun classes,” he said. “This one is great. If there were a major in creativity, I’d do that.”

“The Ides of September” will be on display today and taken down over the weekend.