A. Fader Magazine and Ping Pong. This looked like fun.

Photo by Maia Stern.

More evidence that London is finally getting it’s act together. The Ping Pong Parlour has opened up in the very heart of SoHo. Go play some games, have some fun. More on their blog right here.

What I love most about this is it’s under the ad agency where I first started. Bless.

Just seen these really great paddles and assorted other PP goodies from design firm Troika in conjunction with the Ron Arad Barbican show I wrote about a while back. There is a whole load of great stuff here.

I’m tempted to the get the Idiot edition. Ha ha.

It’s been a busy few weeks in ping pong world. So busy that I never even had time to tell you that Team CPP won the Puma PT3 tournament a few weeks ago. There was some hot - and I mean hot - competition but we finally beat Jeff Staple’s design team in a nail-biting final. Jeff will be appearing in the next issue of CPP. Which will come out sometime this year century. I’ll post some pics when Khari gets his act together and sends me them. Ping pongers = slackers. Debate.

One person who is not slacking, no siree, is Fredi Brodmann. His awesome blades continue to sell well and he even has a table now. You like the look of that table? Of course you do. You want to win that table? Of course you do. All you need to do is enter the Brodmann Blades tournament held at SPiN on Monday. I’ll be there.

Until then slackers.

Check this shit out. The iPad is the table, the phones are the paddles. Not sure whether it’s fake or not but it’s kinda cool.

Following on from the Ron Arad show at the Barbican the main London newspaper, the Evening Standard (ah, how I miss those hot crowded journeys home on the tube with nothing but a copy of ES magazine to stave off the snarling throng…) has done a big article on Ping Pong Mania.

Dave is playing, we know Boris likes a knock and it seems there are a few clubs opening up. SPiN are thinking about expansion to LA and maybe Berlin. Next stop London?

SPiN and Susan Sarandon are holding a Pre Oscar party in LA next week. I was invited but I’ll be in Utah. Shame as I think it sounds like a fun event and as you’ll find out in the next issue of Celebrity Ping Pong George Clooney likes to have a little dabble.

Interesting…Li Ning, China’s biggest sports brand has opened their first store in the US. The Portland store will have regular ping pong demonstrations as they try to sell the game (and other chinese sports) to the US market.

It will be interesting to see how that all pans out. Watch this space.

Tuesday night, while I was working, and not at SPiN playing ping pong Scarlett and Axl Rose were playing our favorite sport. Stupid work.

If I ever play Axl Rose I’ll unleash a furious smash on the first point and then when he looks at me incredulously I’ll just wail back, “Jungle. Welcome to the Jungle!” high five some other dude and keep playing. Or something.

Very cool industrial designer / artist / architect Ron Arad has a new show at the Barbican in London. Part of the show is about his love for the game. There is a table designed by him - yes please, thanks - and a little flash game on the barbican site. Have a butchers here.