Experiential "museums" are everywhere right now.
At the Museum of Ice Cream, which just announced that its San Francisco pop-up is now a permanent attraction, visitors romp in a pool of plastic sprinkles and swing on oversize ice cream sandwiches. At Candytopia — coming soon to a city near you! — attendees perch on giant emojis and admire portraits of Frida Kahlo constructed entirely out of jelly beans. At the Egg House, guests embark on an "eggventure," and at the Rose Mansion, they swing from a golden chandelier and step up to a blending station where they mix and match various bottles to create their own perfect frankenwine.
And at absolutely all of these venues, they take photos: selfies, usies and portraits in room after room of Instagram-bait backdrops and scenes built specifically for visitors to strike a pose, immortalize their attendance and share it with everyone else.
Now, Las Vegas is getting its own experiential attraction, one with a theme perhaps better suited to an interactive social media playground than eggs or wine: cannabis.
The Cannabition Cannabis Museum opened on Sept. 20 at Neonopolis, a long-struggling shopping center on the Fremont Street Experience in downtown Las Vegas.
Las Vegas mayor Carolyn Goodman and Cannabition founder J.J. Walker, center left and right, cutting the ribbon at the immersive marijuana museum in downtown Las Vegas.
"We created this journey where we take people from seed to celebration," said founder J.J. Walker. "The narrative is you are THC."
Walker is a relative veteran of the marijuana industry, who previously had a business in Colorado called 420 Tours, taking visitors on cannabis-focused excursions and "producing hundreds of events around marijuana."
"I was going to bring that company to Vegas," he said, but the laws prohibiting public consumption make a marijuana tour company a decidedly less enticing prospect in the land of blackjack and neon. Essentially, he said, "You can buy it, but you cannot smoke it anywhere whatsoever at all."
Instead, Walker had a revelation after visiting the Museum of Ice Cream in Los Angeles. "It hit me like a ton of bricks. This would be absolutely perfect for marijuana."
That was 14 months ago. Today, Cannabition is open to the public, charging $24.50 per ticket and inviting visitors on a trip through the cannabis life cycle with a series of spaces dedicated to stages like the seed, the grow, the harvest and the smoking experience.
Walker says the attraction is meant to bridge the gap between Instagram-centered spaces like the Museum of Ice Cream and more experiential art exhibits, like Santa Fe-based Meow Wolf's immersive installations. There are "hero moments" built for the 'gram and "discovery moments" focused on education.
Cannabition starts with the seed, in a space designed to feel like it's underground, with roots hanging from the ceiling. In the grow room, a giant caterpillar is the central character, while the harvest space features giant, 7-foot-tall "hug a buds," modeled after five different strains.
Eventually, Walker said, "you get smoked up." Guests climb a staircase then zip down a slide through a pair of oversize lips to land in a pool filled with foam "nugs." (The No. 1 rule of Instagram "museums": There must be a ball pit.)
Throughout the journey, visitors will also notice the integration of sponsors into the various exhibits. Walker said he's experimenting with experiential marketing, working with cannabis-related companies to tie their brands into the attraction. The slide, for example, is sponsored by Leafly, a website featuring cannabis news and reviews. W Vapes sponsors the indica and sativa room. If the spaces are successful, he added, the brands will "create an emotional connection with the consumer through a physical experience."
Though Cannabition is already open, Walker said it's still just 75% of the way to fulfilling his vision. He plans to refresh the space with new installations and art pieces every three or four months, and he's hopeful that the city will write new social consumption laws next year paving the way for public lounges and venues where visitors can partake in legally purchased cannabis.
"It could be a game changer," he said. "We hope that we're going to drive a lot of traffic without the consumption, and then when we can figure out consumption, it's just going to be the cherry on top."
For now, after visitors are harvested and smoked, they'll continue into the ritual room, which is dedicated to exploring different forms of marijuana consumption. They can peer through a joint-shaped kaleidoscope, pose with a massive gummy bear molded from $20,000 worth of silicone or ogle what Cannabition proclaims as the world's largest bong, a 24-foot-tall tower of glass commissioned for the space and affectionately known as "Bongzilla."
For his part, Walker's favorite vignette from his venue is that oversize piece of faux candy. "I love the gummy," he said. "It's just this monstrosity of silicone, and it just makes you feel good."
For more information, visit https://cannabition.com.