The 2026 Stony Awards: Meet the Icons Who Shaped Cannabis Culture This Year

Every industry has its awards season. Hollywood has the Oscars. Music has the Grammys. And cannabis? Cannabis has the Stony Awards — High Times' annual celebration of the people who didn't just participate in cannabis culture but actively bent its arc forward. The 2026 class just dropped, and honestly, it reads like a who's-who of everything that makes this plant and its community so interesting.

From hip-hop royalty to legendary growers, from social justice warriors to the unlikely duo that put cannabis on network television, this year's honorees tell the story of where cannabis culture has been, where it is right now, and where it's heading. Let's meet the class.

Wiz Khalifa: The Living Embodiment of Cannabis Culture

If you need to explain modern cannabis culture to an alien who just landed on Earth, you could save yourself a lot of time by just playing Wiz Khalifa's discography on shuffle. From "Kush & Orange Juice" to building an actual cannabis brand empire, Wiz didn't just rap about weed — he turned his genuine, unapologetic love for the plant into an identity that millions of fans adopted as their own.

The Stony Awards committee called him "the living embodiment of cannabis culture," and that's not hyperbole. Think about the trajectory. In the early 2010s, when mainstream artists were still carefully calibrating how much cannabis content they put in their music, Wiz released an entire mixtape named after his favorite smoke-session combo. He wore the Taylor Gang lifestyle like a second skin — not as a marketing strategy, but because that was genuinely who he was on any random Tuesday afternoon.

What makes his inclusion in the 2026 class particularly resonant is the way Wiz has evolved alongside the industry itself. He went from rolling joints on camera during interviews to building Khalifa Kush, a cannabis brand with real retail presence in legal markets. He demonstrated something the industry desperately needed to see: that authenticity and commercial viability aren't mutually exclusive. You can love the plant and build a real business around it at the same time.

For a generation of consumers who grew up streaming "Black and Yellow" and "We Dem Boyz," Wiz Khalifa is proof that cannabis culture isn't something you put on for a photo op. It's a lifestyle, a vibe, and apparently, a pretty solid business plan.

Snoop Dogg and Martha Stewart: The Duo That Proved How Far We've Traveled

Let's be honest — if you pitched "Snoop Dogg and Martha Stewart host a cooking show together" to a TV executive in 2005, you'd have been laughed out of the room. In 2026, their partnership isn't just normal; it's one of the most powerful symbols of how radically cannabis culture has shifted in mainstream America.

The Stony Awards honored them as a duo, and that's exactly right, because the magic isn't in either of them individually — it's in what they represent together. Snoop brings decades of cannabis advocacy baked into every verse and every public appearance. Martha brings the mainstream establishment, the homemaker demographic, the audience that never in a million years thought they'd be giggling along with the D-O-double-G about edible dosing.

Their collaboration proved something that activists and advocates had been arguing for years: cannabis isn't a subculture. It's culture, period. When Martha Stewart — the woman who built an empire on table settings and holiday decorations — can sit next to Snoop Dogg and talk about infused recipes without anyone blinking, that's not just entertainment. That's a cultural seismic shift captured on camera.

The duo also quietly demonstrated that cannabis culture is intergenerational, cross-demographic, and far more inclusive than its stereotypes suggest. They didn't bridge the gap between cannabis and the mainstream. They showed us the gap had already closed, and we just hadn't noticed.

Mary Bailey: The Dope Award for Last Prisoner Project Work

Not all cannabis heroes are on magazine covers. Mary Bailey received the Dope Award for her work with the Last Prisoner Project, an organization dedicated to getting people out of prison for cannabis offenses that are now legal in most of the country. In a year when the industry spends a lot of time celebrating revenue numbers and market projections, Bailey's recognition is a necessary reminder that thousands of people are still locked up for something you can buy at a dispensary in over half of U.S. states.

The Last Prisoner Project has been one of the most effective organizations in the cannabis justice space, combining legal advocacy, reentry support, and public awareness campaigns to address the human toll of prohibition. Bailey's contributions have helped keep the organization's mission front and center during a period when the industry's rapid commercialization could easily overshadow the people left behind.

Her Dope Award speaks to something the Stony Awards get right every year: cannabis culture isn't just about consumption. It's about justice, equity, and the ongoing work of repairing the damage that decades of criminalization inflicted on communities across the country. When someone receives a life-altering sentence for a substance that's now generating billions in tax revenue, that's not ancient history. That's an active wound. And people like Mary Bailey are doing the daily work to heal it.

Jorge Cervantes: The Legendary Grower

If you've ever grown a cannabis plant — or even thought about it — you've probably encountered Jorge Cervantes. The legendary cultivator and author has been teaching people how to grow cannabis for decades, and his body of work represents one of the most comprehensive educational resources the industry has ever produced.

Cervantes isn't flashy. He doesn't have a viral TikTok presence or a celebrity endorsement deal. What he has is something more valuable: the trust of an entire generation of growers who learned their craft through his books, videos, and hands-on instruction. His "Cannabis Encyclopedia" remains one of the most-referenced cultivation guides in existence, and his willingness to share knowledge freely helped democratize growing during an era when most cultivation expertise was passed down through informal, underground networks.

His Stony Award recognition is a nod to the backbone of cannabis culture: the growers. Without people like Cervantes dedicating their lives to understanding and teaching the agricultural science behind the plant, the modern industry — with its craft cultivars and terpene-first shopping experiences — simply wouldn't exist.

Ed Rosenthal: Teaching a Generation About Cannabis

Ed Rosenthal is, in many ways, the OG of cannabis education. Often called the "Guru of Ganja," Rosenthal has spent decades writing, teaching, and advocating for cannabis at a time when doing so carried genuine legal risk. His inclusion in the 2026 Stony Awards class is both a lifetime achievement honor and a recognition that his work continues to matter in an era of legal commerce.

Rosenthal's "Marijuana Grower's Handbook" has been a foundational text for cultivators since its first edition, and his columns for High Times helped shape the publication's identity as more than just a counterculture magazine. He brought scientific rigor to cannabis journalism when the mainstream media was still treating every marijuana story as a punchline.

What makes Rosenthal's legacy particularly relevant in 2026 is the way his educational philosophy anticipated the current market. He always argued that informed consumers make better decisions, that understanding the plant's biology leads to better cultivation, and that knowledge — not just access — is the real key to cannabis liberation. The terpene-first, lab-tested, educated consumer market we're living in right now? Ed Rosenthal was laying the groundwork for it 30 years ago.

EsDeeKid: The Emerging Cultural Force

Every Stony Awards class needs to honor the future alongside the past, and EsDeeKid fills that role in 2026. Recognized as an emerging cultural force in cannabis, EsDeeKid represents the next generation of voices shaping how the plant is perceived, consumed, and celebrated.

While the established names on this list carry decades of history, EsDeeKid's inclusion signals High Times' recognition that cannabis culture is a living, evolving thing. New voices bring new perspectives, new audiences, and new creative energy. The culture that Snoop and Wiz helped build doesn't stay static — it grows, diversifies, and reinvents itself through emerging figures who bring their own authenticity to the table.

The emerging-force designation is also a reminder that cannabis culture's best days aren't behind it. As legalization spreads and stigma continues to fade, the space for creative, cultural, and entrepreneurial contributions only gets larger. EsDeeKid is part of a generation that grew up in a world where cannabis wasn't forbidden fruit — it was just fruit. That shift in baseline perspective produces fundamentally different cultural output, and the industry is better for it.

Polita Pepper: Social Anthropologist and Cannativa Co-Founder

Polita Pepper's inclusion in the 2026 class brings an intellectual depth to the Stony Awards that elevates the entire conversation. As a social anthropologist and co-founder of Cannativa, Pepper approaches cannabis from a perspective that most industry figures simply don't have: the intersection of cultural study, social equity, and community building.

Cannativa's work focuses on the cultural and social dimensions of cannabis, bridging academic understanding with grassroots advocacy. In a market that often reduces cannabis to THC percentages and revenue numbers, Pepper's anthropological lens reminds us that this plant has been woven into human cultures for thousands of years, and that the modern legal market is just the latest chapter in a much longer story.

Her recognition also speaks to the growing diversity of voices in cannabis leadership. The industry's early legal years were dominated by a relatively narrow demographic profile. Figures like Polita Pepper are expanding that profile, bringing perspectives grounded in community health, cultural preservation, and social science. The result is a cannabis culture that's more reflective of the actual diversity of the people who use, grow, and love the plant.

What the 2026 Class Tells Us About Cannabis Culture Right Now

Step back and look at this year's Stony Awards class as a whole, and it tells a coherent story about where cannabis culture stands in mid-2026. You've got entertainment icons (Wiz, Snoop, Martha) who normalized cannabis in the mainstream. You've got justice advocates (Mary Bailey) keeping the industry honest about its obligations. You've got legacy educators (Cervantes, Rosenthal) whose decades of work built the knowledge base the modern market runs on. You've got emerging voices (EsDeeKid) carrying the culture forward. And you've got intellectual leaders (Polita Pepper) deepening our understanding of what cannabis means to human society.

That's a class that reflects a culture in full bloom — commercially vibrant, socially conscious, historically aware, and creatively energized. Not bad for a plant that was on Schedule I not long ago.

The Stony Awards have always been less about trophies and more about storytelling. They answer a simple question each year: who moved the needle? In 2026, the answer is a group of people who, collectively, demonstrate that cannabis culture isn't one thing. It's a rich, complicated, evolving ecosystem of voices, and it's never been more interesting than it is right now.

Explore cannabis news, find dispensaries, and join the community at Budpedia.