PAINT NIGHT BRUSHES UP ON POT LAW
Art classes set for Everett
A Denver company that puts a weed-friendly spin on the paintnight craze is bringing events to the Boston area.
Puff, Pass & Paint encourages participants ages 21 and older to bring their own cannabis and light up, vape or eat marijuana edibles while they explore the creative process of painting. Owner Heidi Keyes started the company in Denver in early 2014 after Colorado legalized recreational marijuana.
“I was working as an artist, and I always have been a cannabis user myself,” said Keyes, a landscape painter. “It took off so quickly that I had to get a bigger studio and expand to more classes.”
The company also has operations in five other locations with legal recreational marijuana — Oakland, Los Angeles and Orange County, Calif.; Washington, D.C.; and Portland, Ore. In Phoenix, it runs events for medical marijuana users.
Puff, Pass & Paint does not supply cannabis to class participants, according to Keyes.
“It’s all BYOC,” she said. “We want to make sure we’re furthering legalization, not harming it.”
Weed “makes people more relaxed and more willing to be themselves” while painting, according to Keyes. “They just enjoy the experience more rather than worrying about creating a perfect painting,” she said.
But weed consumption isn’t required.
“It’s more just about creating a safe space where it is an option,” Keyes said.
Boston-area classes will be held at Kreative Kollective Studios, a private communal workspace for artists in Everett. Keyes will teach the first class Saturday, and then use local artists when weekly Saturday sessions start April 7. The two-hour classes accommodate up to 50 people and run $39 to $49, with all art supplies included.
Pass & Paint’s private events will operate outside control of the state Cannabis Control Commission, which is charged with regulating Massachusetts’ legal marijuana industry and is developing licensing regulations for sales set to begin in July and businesses that could include public social consumption operations.
“We only have jurisdiction over those establishments we license,” a commission spokeswoman said. “This would not be in our jurisdiction.”
Gov. Charlie Baker, House Speaker Robert DeLeo and other officials have called on the commission to hold off on licensing marijuana cafes, delivery-only businesses and mixed-use businesses such as cinemas and massage parlors that would offer marijuana products until an initial retail market is up and running. The commission will meet to review feedback it received to its proposed rules today through Wednesday. A final commission vote on its regulations is due next week.
Keyes’ company, which is affiliated with CannabisTours.com, also offers other classes including Puff, Pass & Pottery and Puff, Pass & Pastry cooking sessions in other markets, and plans to eventually expand its Boston-area operations.
“We’re going to start with the painting first and then go on to more legal creative classes and tours,” she said.