The history of Wedding Cake

Timeline

1. Mid-2000sSan Francisco breeder Jigga crosses his F1 Durb with an OG Kush to make GSC and with Granddaddy Purple to make Cherry Pie, the two strains of the older account of Wedding Cake’s parents.⁴
2. 2000sSeed Junky Genetics starts out in a small garage, according to SeedFinder; its breeder goes by J Beezy and has never released his full name.^5,6
3. Mid-2010sSeed Junky crosses Triangle Kush with Animal Mints, and the line’s #23 phenotype becomes Wedding Cake; Prime Cuts Nursery dates this to the mid-2010s and says the Jungle Boys named it.^1,7,8
4. 2018Triangle Mints #23 (aka Wedding Cake) wins first place for best hybrid at the SoCal Medical Cannabis Cup.⁴
5. 2018–2019Growers’ entries place at the Emerald Cup in both years, at the Karma Cup (first for hybrid in 2019) and at the Highlife Cup in 2019, per SeedFinder.⁵
6. 2019Headset later ranks it the year’s second best-selling strain across US and Canadian markets, behind Blue Dream, and the top seller in Washington.²
7. Dec 2019Leafly names Wedding Cake its 2019 Strain of the Year, the first for Seed Junky; its search interest has doubled year over year and it is on more than 10,000 store menus.^3,9
8. 2021–2023Leafly’s most-visited strain page three years running.¹⁰
9. 2022–2024A top-10 flower strain in California three years running; #4 with $15.7 million in January–November 2024 sales.¹¹
10. 2024Leafly reports a first place for solvent-infused pre-rolls at the 2024 Emerald Cup.¹⁰
11. 2025#3 in Leafly dispensary orders nationwide and the top strain in Washington.¹²
12. May–Jun 2026Seed Junky releases Cake Straws, an update of Wedding Cake, online and then at the Mary Jane Berlin conference.⁶
13. Sep 2026Washington’s top-selling strain in August sales, per The Marijuana Herald; its offspring LA Kush Cake and Wedding Pie lead Alaska and Rhode Island.¹³
14. 2018–2024The 3,090 state lab tests of Wedding Cake flower in our dataset date from these years.¹⁴

Why it spread

It capped a wave. Leafly’s editors describe Wedding Cake as the culmination of the dessert craze of early legalization, with “a catchy name that evokes celebration and indulgence”, and call it “the strain that started the cake craze”.^9,15 It also worked for growers: Headset noted in 2020 that, for the second best-selling strain, it had a relatively low brand ranking, meaning it was doing well for the brands producing it, and Weedmaps says the #23 cut spread widely through cuttings.^1,2

Then it became a parent. Ice Cream Cake, Gelato Cake, LA Kush Cake, Wedding Pie and Wedding Crasher all descend from it, and three of its children were the top-selling strain in a state in 2025 or 2026.^{12,13,16,17,18,19,20} Leaf Magazines wrote in 2026 that a huge wave of Cake in the late 2010s produced Cake strains that fell flat and that connoisseurs drifted away, before J Beezy told it, “People want Cake again.”⁶

The breeder

Seed Junky Genetics is based in Los Angeles and works out of a 50,000-square-foot converted rocket factory in Northridge, California; Leaf Magazines reports that most of its revenue comes from selling flower in California and licensing its genetics to partners in other states and countries, not from seeds.⁶ Leafly’s 2024 guide to Cake crosses lists Ice Cream Cake, Jungle Cake, Cake Crasher and Papaya Cake among its other work.¹⁰

Where the name comes from

Accounts differ. GrowDiaries’ breeder listing and Prime Cuts Nursery say the Jungle Boys gave the cut its nickname for its vanilla cake frosting aroma; Barney’s Farm says it is named for being “smothered in THC crystals, like a well iced wedding spectacular”.^8,21,22

The disputed parts of the story

• Parents: Triangle Kush × Animal Mints per the breeder; Cherry Pie × GSC in the account Leafly called widely believed in 2019 (see genetics).^3,9
• Date: Prime Cuts Nursery says the mid-2010s, Leafly wrote in 2024 that its users had spent eight years loving it, and Leaf Magazines called it a seven-year-old strain in 2026; the earliest dated event in these sources is the 2018 SoCal cup.^4,6,8,10
• Cup category: Leafly’s genealogy records first place for best hybrid at the 2018 SoCal Medical Cannabis Cup, while its 2019 Strain of the Year article lists first place for indica flower at the SoCal High Times Cannabis Cup, with no year.^3,4
• Pink Cookies: Leafly calls it Wedding Cake’s Canadian name but also keeps a separate Pink Cookies entry with GSC × Cherry Pie parents.^23,24