Denver’s second licensed social marijuana business to open this fall as vaping bar and lounge
Shaban Athuman, The Denver Post
Shawn and Dina Case, of Bloomfield, Ky., shop for smoking paraphernalia on Aug. 16, 2018, at The Coffee Joint, which received Denver’s first social marijuana license.
Denver’s licensing director signed off Friday on the city’s second license for a marijuana consumption area in a business, paving the way for a vaping bar and lounge to open this fall.
The owners of Vape and Play plan to open the 21-and-over social lounge and entertainment venue in November or sooner, depending on the timing of a renovation of the building at 1753 S. Broadway. Co-owner Taylor Rosean says the lounge will be centered around a “multi-station, saloon-style vape bar,” though customers will have to bring their own marijuana per the rules of Denver’s 2016 voter-passed Initiative 300.
Because of restrictions contained in the initiative and regulations added by the city, prospective applicants for I-300 licenses have run into roadblocks in trying to open businesses.
That has spurred calls by activists and even some City Council members to relax 1,000-foot buffers that prohibit licensees near schools, park facilities, drug treatment centers and licensed child cares.
But Vape and Play’s owners were able to find a location in a busy Broadway district that is known by some as “the Green Mile” for the concentration of dispensaries in the area. The Overland Park Neighborhood Association endorsed the license, with some conditions on its operation.
“This will be one of the first legal spaces for tourists, eager to partake in our cannabis culture, to safely and legally consume the products they are already purchasing here as they visit,” Rosean wrote in an email. “Not to mention we will be providing a space for locals who rent and are not allowed to consume on their property per their lease, or just for people who would like to enjoy cannabis in a space that isn’t their living room.”
The approval of its license by Ashley Kilroy, executive director of the city’s Department of Excise and Licenses, follows the granting of the first license to The Coffee Joint in February. That business is located next to a dispensary that has shared ownership in La Alma/Lincoln Park.
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