Free admission (all visitors, all hours).
Hours
Thurs – Sat: 12 pm
Table tennis has catapulted out of your parents’ basement and landed in the hippest hot spots in America. Pongtopia showcases this popular sport as never before—world-class players battling on center court, the New York metro area’s most amazing players competing for the Brookfield Cup championship, top pros offering advice on topspin and tables painted by legendary graffiti artists on display for an auction to benefit Operation Design, a nonprofit that works with NYC public schools to promote the fact that great design creates ideal environments to learn, work and thrive.
Curated by Billi Kid
I will have a paddle on display! Bong! Check it out...
My hand painted ping pong paddle is featured in today's New York Post. newspaper. DON'T MISS!: A LITTLE RACKET Mind your table manners when the World Financial Center’s Winter Garden hosts Pongtopia! For the pingpong extravaganza, a half-dozen tables will be set up for the public to play on today (noon to 2 p.m.) and tomorrow (noon to 5 p.m.). Pingpong fans can also watch the experts: Tonight from 6 to 10, there’s an amateur tournament, and tomorrow, the Downtown Dirty Dozen tourney hits the main table at noon. Forty pingpong paddles decorated by artists are being sold for $250 each, to benefit NYC schools. “[Tonight] when it gets crowded and goes crazy, I’ll actually get drunk and play half-naked in a Speedo and beat people,” quips professional table-tennis player Kazuyuki Yokoyama, who’s crossing paddles with the amateurs tonight. “It’s sort of an art movement and entertainment,” he says of the event. 220 Vesey St.; 212-945-0505, artsworldfinancialcenter.com — Brian Niemietz
