Sport England’s new fund for public ping pong tables

Ping! is a recreational table tennis initiative which has brought a surge of new interest to the game.  Funded by Sport England, the idea behind Ping! is to take the sport to where large numbers of people can enjoy playing regularly – installing tables across city landmarks, from museums to motorway cafes, stations to shopping centres, parks to local estates.  The tables are free for everyone to use and enjoy.

The project has taken place in London, Birmingham and Hull to date and now, to extend the reach ofPing!, Sport England are making new funding available by setting aside £250,000 of lottery funding to pay for public ping pong tables.  The Ping! the Public fund will enable all kinds of social enterprises and community organisations to bid for funds to host a public table.

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Opposite to the ‘top down’ concept of urban design is BETTER BLOCK, founded in Dallas’ Oak Cliff by Jason Roberts and Andrew Howard. The Better Block project is a demonstration tool that temporarily re-visions an area to show the potential to create a walkable, vibrant, neighborhood center. The idea and the charrettes to realize it have quickly spread to cities like Memphis, St. Louis, New York, and Boston. National media coverage includes NPR, the Washington Post, and the New York Times.

It was great to have East London Lines at the World’s Longest Pong on Sunday. They’ve captured the spirit of the event in this short film East Londoners smash ping pong rally world record.mov, and featured us in both the build-up and in celebration after the event. You can read the full article here

Will Stewart‘s super-shots from the World’s Longest Pong, Sunday Nov 20, 2011, Rich Mix can be found by clicking here. And below are a few of our favourites to whet you appetite:

Untitled Space & Young Offenders Institute‘s all new English Ping Pong Association has subject to confirmation from Guinness broken the world record for the most people in a single ping pong rally! The World’s Longest Pong happened at Rich Mix, Bethnal Green on Sunday 20 November 2011. As you can see from the video below, it really did bring together people of all ages, backgrounds and ping pong ability. Well done, everyone of the 160+ people, you all played your part! Those scenes at the end are pretty special…

The Guardian wrote a great article about ping pong’s friendly distinction with table tennis, championed Untitled Space (a little bit) and plugged Sunday’s World’s Longest Pong. You can read the full article by Paul Torpey right here

The piece talks about the game’s shifting profile, and the recent surge in popularity, that even the English Table Tennis Association (the sport’s governing body) attribute to the rise of the social game in new and unexpected location. Interestingly, the readers seem less convinced about ping pong’s combination with music and a few drinks, and more worried about our respective haircuts and hipster tendencies.

Make some judgements yourself when you come along to the English Ping Pong Association’s launch on Sunday. The World’s Longest Pong starts at noon – you can sign up right here!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/nov/17/ping-pong-sociable-table-tennis

Win £1500 for your empty shop project courtesy of 3Space. The competition has been set up to reward charitable organisations who can come up with innovative and creative ways to temporarily use vacant shop space. The projects must use one of 3Space‘s current properties, located right across the country and all entries must be submitted by 10 November 2011. For full competition details visit http://www.highstreethijack.org/ .

Entries should balance creativity, with feasibility. The winning project will be realised early in 2012. Entries will be judged on Originality and Creativity, Reach and Benefit and Community Involvement, with the over all winner announced on 1 December

Click here for an entry form

Hackney’s Art in Empty Spaces programme have secured a new property, 297 Hoxton Street, and are now inviting proposals for meanwhile projects commencing from Jan 3rd 2012. If you’re interested, see more information here, and ready to submit your proposals no later than 5pm on Monday 7th November 2011.

What Hackney Regeneration Office say: “We are delighted to announce that we have secured another property for our Art in Empty Spaces Programme. We are inviting proposals for 297 Hoxton Street, which is a Council owned unit and will be available on a rent free period for up to 6 months on a ‘meanwhile lease’ basis, see more information here: http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/regeneration/meanwhileuselease       We are looking for a project that will be able to take on a lease at 297 Hoxton Street and begin to deliver activities from 3^rd January 2012. Please find attached an application form and supporting property detail document.     Our Art in Empty Spaces programme is aimed at those individuals/organisations that are seeking to develop initiatives, which will contribute to the overall well being of our neighbourhoods. This call, whilst welcoming arts projects, we are also keen to support projects that demonstrate how their activity will deliver against one or more of Hackney’s wider priorities outlined in our Sustainable Communities Strategy and/or draft Economic Development Strategy, see details of both documents here: http://www.hackney.gov.uk/community-strategy.htm     http://www.hackney.gov.uk/regeneration.htm

For information on the current Art in Empty Spaces programme please visit: http://www.artinemptyspaces.org.uk and to get hold of an application form contact hannah.dalgleish@hackney.gov.uk

The deadline for receiving applications is 5pm on Monday 7^thNovember. Please send all applications back to our Art in Empty Spaces email: regen@hackney.gov.uk“

Between 3 & 25 November the Comica, the London International Comics Festival does pretty much what the name says.

There’ll be exhibitions, of course, talks, a conference, film screenings and a club night! Read more on the official website here or via ubiquitous social media site here.

For the lazier readers, we’ve picked out some highlights of our own below:

Comica Comiket: Independent Comics Fair
From solo authors to innovative majors, meet & buy direct from UK creators & publishers at Comica Comiket. More…
Where: Bishopsgate Institute, 230 Bishopsgate, London
When: November 12, 2011 – 11am to 6pm

Launch Party: Nobrow 6 – The Double
Comica Festival opens with the free launch party of the new edition of the biannual Nobrow journal. More…
Where: Jaguar Shoes, 32/34 Kingsland Rd, Shoreditch E2 8DA
When: November 3, 2011 – 6.30pm to 9.30pm

Comica Symposium: Transitions II
A gathering for academic-types promoting the research of comics, graphic novels and manga. More…
Where: School of Arts, Birkbeck University, London WC1E 7HX
When: November 5, 2011 

The History & Future Of Superheroes
Paul Gravett’s illustrated overview of how the superhero genre was born, has evolved & is heading next. More…
Where: Islington Central Library, 2 Fieldway Crescent, London N5
When: November 23, 2011 – From 7pm

Spacehive is a new online funding platform for neighbourhood improvement projects. By giving communities collective financial power to deliver locally locally popular projects free from local authority bureaucracy and to offset public space spending cuts.

The site introduces ideas, communities and creatives to develop local projects and provides the platform to promote and fund schemes too.

The people behind Spacehive clearly harbour frustrations with the current top-down system, and through simplifying the process they seek to boost community participation in planning and increase the sense of satisfaction and ownership of local public space.

Watch out for the upcoming wave of pilot projects, and if momentum gets going, important developments for the UK planning system.

Spacehive was recently winner of Big Venture Challenge, a competition to find Britain’s best social enterprise and boasts among their advisors and supporters Sunand Prasad (Co-founder of Penore & Prasad and former President of RIBA) and Victoria Thornton (Founding Director of Open City)