RICHMOND — What was once the house of a Richmond cannabis dispensary has now been transformed right into a community space with a nine-hole pop-up mini-putt course handcrafted by local artists with the inner child in mind.
Hidden beneath a mural that encourages “keeping hope alive” near the Central Avenue exit of Interstate 80 in Richmond is a mini-golf course run by husband-and-wife team Julian Bergstein and Elaina Mastrilli, with assistance from Ben Grambergu, the pinnacle , conceived and built behind Exit Now, an area for arts and community events.
“People come to Richmond to have fun and are taken to a beautiful place,” Bergstein said. “It’s nice to be a part of it.”
The Pierce Street course offers challenges accessible to all ages, putting the type of your individual adventure on the classic family-friendly activity. A windmill on the primary hole can remain stationary or speed up to extend friendly competition. The swinging pillar of hole five has proven tougher for adults than children, and hole nine levels the playing field with a Plinko-style finish, leaving the end result as much as probability.
Vibrant colours and interactive features are designed to immerse course attendees in a board game, Mastrilli said. Each hole must be fun and exciting, slightly difficult but not frustrating.
“It should be part of a community space. Anyone can come and play. We wanted it to be affordable and accessible,” Mastrilli said.
Overall, players should have the option to finish the course in around 20 to half-hour. It is a self-service facility with a QR code at the doorway gate and a gumball machine that dispenses golf balls in the beginning, allowing visitors to enter and play anytime between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m., seven days per week.
From conception to installation, developing the course took just a couple of months, Mastrilli said. The couple, mini-putt fans themselves, had long dreamed of constructing their very own course, and Grambergu was searching for an exciting activity to bring to the course.
As an artist who dedicated 16 hours a day to creating the course, which resembles an interactive sculpture, Mastrilli said watching people putt on the holes was each frightening and exciting.
“It’s the ultimate reward for any creator,” Mastrilli said. “Art is a language. When someone understands it and resonates with it, you feel seen and validated.”
For Grambergu, Exit Now was a passion project. The venue, at 3223 Pierce St., is meant to be a community space where neighbors of all backgrounds can enjoy entertainment, discover latest things like vegan food during a monthly food truck event and luxuriate in an art gallery created by Jacob Clark, an East-based artist Bay, is curated. Works are also presented within the room.
The vision first got here to Grambergu “like a fever dream” in 2022 at Burning Man, an annual desert event focused on art, community constructing and self-expression. But plans really took off during an April 20 cannabis event at 7 Stars Holistic Center, a cannabis dispensary that was once positioned in the identical constructing at Exit Now.
“I wanted to bring some of that whimsy into our own backyard,” Grambergu said, praising his landlord and executives, Zee Handoush and seven Stars co-founders Joe Dayem, for helping him realize his vision of the bottom.
The Putt-Putt pop-up is scheduled to be taken down before winter rains by October thirty first. Depending on demand, the date could possibly be postponed, said Grambergu. Gramsbergu said he could imagine that after the course is disbanded, it could potentially pop up in numerous locations, corresponding to a brewery or community space.
As for the longer term of Exit Now, Grambergu said he plans to seek out latest creative ways to make use of the space. He envisions a free tool library out front, arcade games inside, more art and food events and other activities that encourage people to place down their phones and connect.
“I can’t wait to see what comes next and who else this inspires,” Grambergu said.
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