If you’ve ever smoked a joint then you know that rolling one is not that easy. Even when you have the all the right tools and the best kind of paper, the only way to learn how to perfect the art is to practice. A lot. And that’s for your garden variety joint, which doesn’t ask for much except for some coordination.
The more that cannabis is embraced by the public, the more creative people get when it comes to making their own joints. If this sounds at all interesting to you, then get ready to learn some of the basics of creative joint rolling. It’s a trial and error experience and one that will consume a large amount of your time. Hopefully, you’ll at least get the respect of your friends.
Here are 5 creative ways to roll a joint, ranging from the basics to the truly crazy stuff:
The Classic
You can find thousands of videos of experts rolling joints, but most of them show off a technique that’s impossible to master when you’re a newbie. This video features David Bienenstock, author of a couple of marijuana books, and is the perfect tutorial for newbies due to several reasons: it’s basic and there’s nothing fancy going on. The joint is average sized and it doesn’t even ask for a filter. After a couple of tries, anyone interested will be able to master it.
The Scorpion
While I’m sure there are infinite ways of rolling joints, the scorpion is the craziest one we found that actually had some video tutorials online. These clips aren’t as fun and as well produced as the previous ones, but they are insane, because someone is taking the time to make a scorpion out of paper and weed. Check it out.
The Tulip
The name of this joint should imply that there’s some arts and craft involved, and there is. The tulip joint asks for you to roll a joint, to paste a bunch of rolling paper together and to basically do some origami. The end result only sort of resembles a tulip, but hey, it’s still cool. There’s a bunch of tutorials out there on tulip joints, with some truly hideous results, but here’s one that’s kind of pretty.
The Cone
Here’s when things get a little more complicated. In this video, a guy says that he’s rolling a “perfect” joint, and he means it. Cone joints are very popular and great for sharing, since they contain more weed than the average joint. They’re also harder to roll, which is where this tutorial comes in.
Homemade joints don’t come any better than this, having two filters, a decent cone shape and a channel than ensures that weed will burn out evenly. You might need a couple of hundred tries to achieve this but you’ll get there someday.
The Cross
The cross joint is the kind of joint you see in stoner movies or in like a frat party. This joint is not for the faint of heart, since when it’s built correctly you’ll basically be smoking from two joints at once. It demands the necessary tools for preparing separate two joints, a big and a small one, and also a needle. For a better and more thorough explanation, just watch the video and enjoy Seth Rogen’s handiwork.
We could write an entire guide just on picking the right bud for your mood, but we don’t have that kind of space here. Besides, maybe we will.
The truth is, there are hundreds—literal hundreds—of strains of marijuana, and aside from a unique and usually silly name, each comes with its own specific profile—flavor, effect, type of treatment, area of affectation, etc.
The kind of weed you pick to fill your joint has nothing to do with how you’re smoking it. For instance, there aren’t really different types of weed that are better to smoke out of a joint compared to, say, a bong or a vaporizer. Strain selection really has more to do with the kind of experience you’re looking to have. This guide gives an excellent look into the two main types of marijuana—indica and sativa—and which strains are specifically relevant to things like pain management, anxiety, sleep, etc. This guide from Herb is exceptionally thorough and easy to understand.
There are even apps! Leafly is considered by many to be the Yelp for medical marijuana. It’s an encyclopedic database of hundreds of strains of marijuana, complete with user reviews, symptoms, etc. You can even plug in specific symptoms you’re having and Leafly will make recommendations to suit them.
Different Techniques
Now that you know the finer details, let’s get down to the nitty gritty: How to roll one of these beautiful bastards.
GQ put out this simple guide that we like a lot, because it’s brief and simplified, and includes some illustrations. The only thing is it may not be detailed enough for all the legitimate amateurs in the room.
This explainer from Leafly is also excellent, and includes .gifs to help illustrate every point of the process.
For the complete novices, this video from Merry Jane features one of our generation’s most trustworthy weed aficionados, Seth Rogen, as he explains how he likes to roll a basic joint. It’s the perfect thing for anyone who wants to know the ins and outs of joint rolling from front to back. Your training could probably end there, but if you master that and want to move on to something more technical, then here’s another video of Rogen rolling one of his famous cross joints.
And if you start feeling ballsy and want to really kick it up a notch, you can check out how this artist is taking the joint game to a whole new level. Apparently as weed goes mainstream, people can get creative with how they roll.
The Rolling Machine
Finally, when all else fails and your fingers just can’t do it right, there are a multitude of joint-rolling machines that, novelty aside, are pretty cool.
Auto rollers come in all different shapes and sizes, and they’re great because if you don’t know how they work, it’s kind of like a little magic trick every time.
Our favorite rolling machine by far, however, are the famous RAW Two-Way Rollers. They’re incredibly easy to use, are super affordable, and can accommodate just about any size rolling paper you can throw at ‘em. They’re the perfect little joint rollers.
Of course, those are only a couple types. This roundup from InternationalHighLife.com offers a pretty good introduction to all types of joint rollers, from the standard two-ways like the one above, to full-on electric operated crazy things.
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While stealing weed from my dads girlfriend I decided instead of using my home made pipe, I would also steal a rolling paper and roll my first ever joint. Thanks for the tips.