With marijuana legalized, tobacco is Gen Z taboo of choice

If you’re throwing a party and want downtown’s new It girl, Meg Superstar Princess, to show up, a couple of things will attract her.

“Anywhere I can smoke inside, I will go,” Meg, 25, told The Post. “Places that allow you to smoke inside feel more luxurious.”

With marijuana now legal in New York City, plain old tobacco seems to be the new taboo — and retro in a way that’s appealing to a younger generation already embracing vinyl LPs, vintage clothing, and flip phones.

The new cigarette brand Hestia, which bills itself as being made from “naked, wild, tobacco,” is seemingly cashing in on that market — getting into the mouths and hands of Gen Z tastemakers such as Meg, fashion influencer (and a rumored ex-flame of Kourtney Kardashian) Luka Sabbat and the hyper-pop musician Slay Lover Boy.

Approved by the FDA last year — and the first new cigarette to get approval in 15 years — Hestias were handed out at the Little Italy restaurant Grotta during a Fashion Week party put on by the hipster newsletter Perfectly Imperfect, as well as a bash celebrating the apparel brand Celine in LA and at celebrity grifter Anna Delvey’s birthday party earlier this year.

“We will make sure the best and brightest are enjoying the very finest,” Hestia’s founder, David Sley, 38, told The Post. “I am trying to reframe tobacco as something that can be enjoyed responsibly like any other product.”

And the fact that you can’t actually buy Hestia cigarettes in New York City yet only makes them more coveted with a certain ahead-of-the-curve demographic. (Now available in Texas and Florida, they will debut for retail sale in New York this summer.)

Working with a limited budget, the cigarette brand has been savvily providing free packs and cartons to social media stars even as the Hochul administration has been quietly exploring the notion of banning tobacco cigarettes in New York State.

But that may also be creating a new youth rebellion.

“By making cigarettes taboo and ridiculously censored, they became cool for young people,” said Meg.

This is despite CDC reports that cigarette smoking is responsible for more than 480,000 deaths annually in the US — or 1,300 people every day. Since 2021, tobacco companies have been required to put warnings, such as “Smoking causes cataracts, which can lead to blindness” and “Smoking reduces blood flow, which can cause erectile dysfunction,” on cigarette packages.

“Cigarettes are terrible but cool,” Meg said. “I know cigarettes are terrible for you. But everybody looks cool with a cigarette … You have to pick your vices in life.”

For a New Year’s Day party, held at what has been described to The Post as “an underground Russian bathhouse” (it’s actually Wall Street Bath & Spa), free Hestias were flowing and smoking inside was tolerated.

“People think smoking is cool,” said Ripley Soprano, the 31-year-old editor and publisher of Dirty magazine, which hosted the bash. “It has the old-school vibe, like in old films and TV shows. Hestia is doing the smart thing: Giving away cigarettes to cool, downtown kids who like to smoke and like to be photographed.”

One who got snapped at the Dirty event is NYCL Kai, a 26-year-old musician and skateboarder.

Normally a Newport smoker — “I’m from the Bronx and in every ‘hood, that is what people smoke,” Kai told The Post – he said he likes the novel aspect of Hestia. 

Hestia was dreamed up by Sley, a former hedge fun analyst when he was sent to Georgia to “trade soybean positions.”

There, he met former tobacco farmers who had turned to growing soybeans because the demand for tobacco had shrunk. He told them that if they “grew the best tobacco” for him he would try to launch what he now calls “the apotheosis of cigarettes.”

Sley claims he is not trying to turn people into addicts.

“Smoking anything can be deleterious. But we all choose to do things that may not be advantageous to our physical health in benefit to our emotional health. For those who choose to spark up cigarettes, I feel that we have the finest product on the market,” he said. “I am going after those who choose to enjoy tobacco on occasion.”

Sley, who said he smokes a couple of cigarettes per day, added, “I make cigarettes I want to smoke. There are people who want an intentional, thoughtful product that is not garbage thought up by a marketing department.”

But that doesn’t stop him from assigning his friend and nightlife photographer Mark “The Cobra Snake” Hunter from spreading around the red-banded cigarettes and photograph people mid-puff.

“I go out to a party, see people smoking and ask if they are interested in a natural cigarette; they get hyped about it,” Hunter told The Post. “We were at South By Southwest and there was a bowl of loose cigarettes. It was fun to watch people grabbing them like candy. It’s a way to delicately advertise.”

Back in New York, the fact that Hestias are currently impossible to purchase in the city adds to the cachet.

“If you see someone smoking a Hestia, you know they probably [got it from the company],” said Soprano. “If you care about that stuff, which a lot of people do, it’s cool.”

Still, Sley said, the hipster gravy train won’t last forever: “I hope I am not giving away too much product. It affects the bottom line. At some point, we have to start selling. I am a capitalist after all.”