Rogue Paq’s Founder Jessica Cadmus—Raise Your Ritual

Your tagline is “Raise Your Ritual.” Talk to us about the importance of ritual in times like these and what we can do to raise our ritual.

Ritual, in “regular times,” is an incredibly important way to stay centered and mindful. In these highly irregular times, ritual gets promoted to status level: Critical. Without these touchpoints during the day, it’s too easy to go down a rabbit hole or to let your mind spin out on unhealthy scenarios. Instituting rituals of all types provides comfort through the structure when all else seems unstable.

I’d love to help you raise your cannabis ritual! First of all, I know you’ll agree, let’s establish that your cannabis ritual is self-care of the most fundamental sort. It is a way for you to connect with yourself deeply. To maximize your experience, I suggest choosing an environment that calms you and where you are surrounded by beauty - outdoors or indoors. Set the scene with some favorite music and light a candle that you love. Get all of your senses involved. Part of appealing to all of the senses is to use beautiful tools and store your flower in a lovely vessel. It’ll come as no shock to you that I store my flower in Rogue Paq UV jars within my Ritual Case. I also use my full line of tools largely because I have spent a tremendous amount of time designing and curating each piece with both aesthetics and function in mind. But, whatever items you choose to use during your ritual, make sure they delight you and work smoothly and efficiently. Next - time to inhale and exhale and reflect. Lastly, I suggest keeping a journal on hand to write down any ideas that come to mind or to get rid of any anxious thoughts you’d like to release.

Tell us about a few of the rituals that help you to stay centered when everything around you feels like a distraction.

I am a person who runs on ritual! I’ve been leaning hard on my morning coffee ritual which includes grinding up whole beans (Intelligentsia, Stumptown, and Blue Bottle are my faves) and then running them through my drip machine. In the early evening cooking is my ritual. I’m Italian and I love (aggressively!) through food. So, preparing every meal is something I do deliberately and with a lot of love. Post-dinner is the time for my most beloved - my cannabis ritual. I like to sit in my favorite room which is full of light and pretty objects. I light my Diptyque Figuier candle and carefully roll my own jay on any number of lovely trays I’ve collected for the purpose. My flower recently has been from Stone Road Farms or 3C Farms. The process of rolling is super cathartic for me. It slows me right down and puts me in a frame of mind to reflect. I favor Devambez rolling papers and use a glass tip. I’ve been taking my hemostats and jay outside and walking and it’s been the mind-clearing activity that has been saving me from feeling completely hopeless. I maintain that it not only keeps me grounded but it also makes me better for everyone else in my household. The last ritual of every day is reading. I am currently reading Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro and Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout. I love this escape before I drift off to sleep.

You’re a stylist in NY and you’ve told us that you designed Rogue Paq Ritual Cases in response to finding your clients’ rituals in some odd vessels. Share a few stashing secrets that you’ve discovered in their closets.

Everyone I style has a super polished aesthetic because we spend lots of time talking about every item they wear and carry. So you can imagine that finding disorganized and ratty rituals horrified me. When this started to develop as a theme, I set out to find something sleek and sophisticated to solve the problem and when I couldn’t come up with anything I loved, I decided to design what turned out to be Rogue Paq Ritual Cases. But, you asked about the strange receptacles I found stashed in closets, underwear drawers, and in medicine cabinets. I have seen everything from shoeboxes, to old and frayed rasta bags, Ziploc bags, old pencil cases, Altoid cans, dopp kits (with no shave tools, just cannabis), a vintage tin flour container, Mason jars, and even an old Rolodex devoid of cards. When I began designing the Ritual Cases, cannabis was not legal anywhere in the US recreationally but it had just become legal medically in CA. It occurred to me in that moment that when people no longer have to hide their beloved ritual, they would want to celebrate it and travel with it, and bring it out in the company of others to be shared. I knew that having a sleek carrier and tools would allow them to do this and so it became my personal mission to make these items available. 

One of our missions is to help destigmatize cannabis by creating beautiful images and informative content around the plant. How do you feel Rogue Paq contributes to the destigmatization?

I feel like anything that is approached with love and respect and attention to detail is lent legitimacy, and legitimacy leads to destigmatization. It has always been important to me as a stylist and cannabis lover to celebrate the plant by demonstrating that it is worthy of well designed, quality products. Therefore, I took the time and put in the effort to create and curate chic and highly functional pieces specifically for use with cannabis. It’s also an homage to the plant. Just as enthusiasts love wine and bourbon and cigars and dedicate space and money to purchase all manner of items with which to enjoy them, I and millions of others love cannabis and so I wanted to elevate the cannabis experience in a similar way. 

We are all about women supporting women in the industry. Tell us about your collaboration with KellyGreen and how that came about.

As an extension of my wardrobe styling, many of my clients ask me to design their interiors. Kelly is an interior designer on the west coast and so we began to chat, first over DM and then via phone. It was Kelly’s suggestion to do a collaboration and I was immediately on board for her idea: she already owned the Solo Paq and thought we should add a tassel. Brilliant! It’s funny to me because we both stepped away to source tassels and came back having identified the very same one. She then had her photographer @permanentglimpse capture stunning photos of our collab and we were off to the races. In her words, “The bridge between stigma and consumption is beautiful products” and I couldn’t agree more. Since then we’ve found a host of ways to support each other from brainstorming to consulting on ideas or even proof-reading content. To quote Kelly again, “I discovered that collaborating with another female founder made me a better designer and more importantly, a better female business owner.”

We are obsessed with your #SendNudes matches and are thrilled to see that you have both white bottoms and brown bottoms available. Do you plan to create any other versions?

Thank you! I love them too. I have a few ideas swirling around in my head for other versions but would love to hear what you and your followers would like to see. A recent DM inquired about when we will make a male version. I’m in love with that idea. Any other ideas? DM me!!

Rogue Paq is part of our Spring MJ VIP Box! To shop Rogue Pag visit roguepaq.com

Use Code MJLIFE for 20% off site wide.

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