At the very end of my tour of the world’s largest cannabis dispensary, CEO Bob Groesbeck takes me outside to see the lotuses. Sticking out from the top of the building are seven large plastic flowers, each with a neon green or orange core. It’s the middle of the day, so they look a little out of place, but Groesbeck assures me that it’s quite impressive at night when the entire complex is lit up and the petals change color. In fact, he says, the artist hired for the installation had created something similar for Burning Man.
That’s when it all starts to make sense.
Until then, I’d been having trouble placing the aesthetic of Planet 13, the “cannabis superstore and entertainment complex” that just opened in Las Vegas. All black and glass, it does have some of the sleek, modernist hotel look Groesbeck is going for. The glass display cases give it a jewelry store vibe, like Kay Jewelers for a different kind of treasure. But nothing quite fits until Groesbeck tells me about the dispensary’s connection to this other Nevada institution. The two share a clear visual and spiritual kinship.
Planet 13, I realize, aspires to be the Burning Man of weed dispensaries. The Black Rock City desert festival emerged from radical counterculture values, yet it has become an increasingly expensive playground for tech moguls arriving on private jets. Both Planet 13 and Burning Man are shiny and neon, vaguely nature-y yet futuristic. Things glow. There are lasers. Both are about alternative values and wellness, but they’re also about being cool and serving as a club for the rich. If anything, they’re about turning alternative values and wellness into being cool — hopefully, in Planet 13’s case, to the tune of millions.
This 24-hour, $7.5 million “theme park for marijuana” is the latest expensive bet on marijuana’s makeover. More than any other drug, marijuana has been linked to politics, activism, and, for a long time, the “dirtbag” and “stoner” stereotypes. Yet, as legalization continues and public opinion toward marijuana becomes more favorable, its meaning is changing again. It has gone from a dangerous substance to be avoided entirely to something only those people do to a potential cash cow so long as you can convince the rich that they want it. From Beboe, the “Hermes of Marijuana,” to the $20 Défoncé Chocolatier bar to a $700 marijuana pendant, the high-end marijuana market is growing, and the drug is expanding into new demographics
Considering it doesn’t even live up to its own promises yet, Planet 13 has a long way to go. “Cannabis superstore and entertainment complex” conjures images of 3D IMAX theaters, a skating rink with a marijuana leaf carved into the ice, and a pot-themed planetarium. Maybe one day. Though the entire property, once a 60-year-old warehouse, comprises 120,000 feet, only about 16,000 — or the size of a couple of mall stores — is developed. The rest is empty space that will someday host a coffee shop and food hall. Still, even in this undeveloped state, the complex offers a glimpse into the flashy, luxury future of a much-stigmatized drug.
Credit: theverge.com
