GRATEFUL DEAD X JOYA

I didn't know the Grateful Dead's music until college when I witnessed a friend (who also wasn't really familiar with their work) become obsessed! He took up the banjo (and became extremely fluent!) and developed a perfectly organized collection of DAT tapes that featured the Dead’s live performances. He essentially altered his style and worldview! I found this powerful.

We said yes to this collaboration for these specific reasons above—the world of the Grateful Dead is a community filled with endurance and passion. It’s meaningful.

At Joya, we also make meaning. We like to push things (too) far, and this involves elevating all the senses at once: the look, feel, smell, silhouettes and textures of our product. In some martial arts, this would be called the "focuses," and creators in fragrance have naturally been drawn to the link between music, sounds, the mechanical senses and scent.

The Sculptural Scented Bears are an obvious organic fit for this focused approach. If you look around, the Bears are almost always represented as flat and two-dimensional. To make them come alive for our very three-dimensional world, we developed them as candy-flavored scents that are nuanced and mouth-watering. Less bubble gum chalk and more jam-filled fun. 

We were introduced to the Grateful Dead team by the excellent Ted Harrington in Spring 2020. Covid obviously challenged every single timeline and deadline, but I'm proud to release such high quality and well-considered products together two years later.