A Unique Weed Brand Launches at Ladies of Paradise

There could be few better mid-winter tonics than partying in a room festooned in cannabis leaf wallpaper, palm-tree-fringed tinsel backdrops and twenty-something-year-old women in fantastic outfits.

Such was the scene on Feb. 14, 2019, at the Ladies of Paradise’s (LOP) launch party for its first cannabis product, Lady Jays — single-source Blue City Diesel prerolls, created in collaboration with The Grow, the Oregon farm of Jimmy Martin, who is LOP owner-operator Jade Daniels’ fiance.

“We will continue to produce our Lady Jays packs with other farms in the future for a co-branded product, only using flower from that farm,” Daniels told Weedmaps News. “For this first round, we worked with my fiance’s farm. Next, we hope to work with Hifi Farms, Oso Verde, Bellevue Farms, and more.”

Ladies of Paradise celebrated the debut of Lady Jays, a preroll that is its first cannabis product, during a Feb. 14, 2019, launch party at its store in Portland, Oregon. (Photo by Deborah Stoll)

LOP’s presence on Instagram is a voyeuristic peek into a shape-shifting collective of artists who create cannabis-focused fashion, dinner parties, and interactive events. The young women also work as stylists and branding experts for like-minded companies, offering their social media expertise, design, and packaging prowess.

The Valentine’s day party took place in LOP’s brick-and-mortar store, which opened in September 2018 in southeast Portland, Oregon, and was packed wall to wall with a lively mix of young men and women, their family members, and babies. In contrast to most cannabis parties, the vibe seemed less about getting high and sitting around binge-eating as it did a regular party that just happened to have a lot of cannabis paraphernalia.

Ladies of Paradise, which provides product design, content development, and events planning for cannabis firms, also operates a storefront at 959 SE Division St. in Portland, Oregon. (Photo by Deborah Stoll)

Part of LOP’s genius seems to be as simple as curating events with activities they themselves would like to partake in, such as getting rhinestones adhered to their teeth courtesy of Goddess Glitter‘s Kelsea Jensen. While this may sound odd … well, it was a little — like bearing witness to someone’s orthodontist appointment if someone’s orthodontist determined they would be much better off with a little bling on their pearly whites. The results? Pretty cool, tbh.

Tour Print was on hand screen-printing T-shirts with the Lady Jays logo in the company’s prevailing  pink motif. There were tables to peruse, filled with LOP’s regular store offerings as well as those of Brooklyn-based Love + Destroy, which flew in to be part of its ally’s festivities.

While a lot of companies use feel-good terminology that doesn’t actually translate when you interact with the creators, LOP’s description of being a “women-positive creative agency + brick-and-mortar” seems like the real deal — a sort-of dream of post-collegiate life in which everyone you know is super-cool, uber-talented, and looking to connect on a creative level.

Screen-printed T-shirts for Lady Jays prerolls were made by Tour Print during the Ladies of Paradise launch party Feb. 14, 2019, in Portland, Oregon. (Photo by Deborah Stoll)

And if you’re wondering what the women of LOP are doing for their community beyond friends and family, a percentage of proceeds from the sale of Lady Jays was donated to the Cascade AIDS Project, a nonprofit that offers HIV/AIDS testing and assistance.

“We will be working with new charities and foundations every couple of months,” Daniels said. “We’ve loved giving back to the community with events, and now with products.”