Bennett Awards worked closely with designers Alex Grey and Allyson Grey, along with their digital artist Taha Alkan, to create the Cannabis Cup, the custom award that is given to each category winner in the HIGH TIMES Cannabis Cup competition.

The HIGH TIMES Cannabis Cup is the world’s leading marijuana trade show, celebrating the world of ganja through cannabis competitions, instructional seminars, expositions, celebrity appearances, concerts and product showcases. Hosted in states that have legalized medical and recreational cannabis, the Cannabis Cup stands as the foremost gathering place for the cannabis community to network and celebrate. Going strong for nearly three decades, HIGH TIMES Cannabis Cups are the most established and trusted in the marijuana industry, continually fighting for the political legitimacy of the plant.

Bennett Awards worked closely with the cup designers to create the physical sculpture for the cups, and then produce the cups from gold-plated zinc. Each cup is mounted on a circular base with engraved plates containing the HIGH TIMES logo, category name, and winner's name.

This custom award cup contains many symbolic images that are sculpted into the cup. Here is how the designers describe this meaning behind these symbols:

To honor the science and spirit of ganja, Alex Grey's sculptural grail created exclusively for HIGH TIMES, embeds chemical, botanical, historical and archetypal symbolism praising cannabis. At the base of the cup are diagrams of medicinal cannabinoid molecules. An inscription on the base reads: “Hail, Cannabis, ancient sacramental healing ally of Humanity.”

Molecular forms emerge on the base and begin to rise up the shaft in a helical DNA strand evoking centuries of genetic cultivation. The helix transforms into an occult symbol of the caduceus, a snake entwined staff of the Greek messenger God Hermes.

Twin double-headed serpents have wings sprouting from all of their crowns that cradle a flaming eye of higher vision. The Serpents of Wisdom represent psychic forces of sensuality, peace and philosophical openness offered through cannabis. Symbols of flaming eyes and wings point to flights of Divine Imagination that arise during stoned reverie. 

The Chinese & Sanskrit script refers to hemp and Bhang, acknowledging the Eastern Civilizations that first planted cannabis at the dawn of agriculture over ten thousand years ago. The Western Civilizations of Greece and America are honored for their worldwide proliferation of the earth’s most beloved and most misunderstood sacred plant. By dating the cultural spread of ganja, we gain knowledge of the cannabis tribe's sacramental history. 

The cup is engraved with outlines of sativa and indica leaves. 

Circling the upper rim of the cup is the Secret Writing of artist, Allyson Grey, a symbol system representing the unpronounceable language of creative expression. The chalice is a container that symbolizes femininity and the womb. Honoring the Divine Feminine, the chalice reminds us that female plants are the most potent and prized cannabis specimens.

The HIGH TIMES Cannabis Cup will be granted during the award show to those who push the evolutionary edge of farming the friendly miracle of marijuana. By drinking from ganja's holy grail, people awaken their soul and empower their energetic flow toward creative engagement with life. May the entire world be healed and uplifted by cannabis.