Hawai'i Convention Center

While lawmakers did set aside $64 million to fix a chronic leaky roof, it may take another year for renovations to start. Teri Orton, the head of the convention center, shared the latest.

Watching anime and playing video games are mainstream activities — but it wasn’t always that way. With about 20,000 attendees this year, Kawaii Kon has played a crucial part in creating a safe space for the fandom community. HPR's Zoe Dym has more.

Event organizers are automatically in the program when using the Convention Center, but can opt-out. The center will donate money from the program’s fund to the Hawaiʻi Legacy Reforestation Initiative every month.

The Conversation talked to John Reyes from the Hawaiʻi Visitors and Convention Bureau about the future of large conventions as the lead time for some conferences is several years in the making.

If you enjoyed last year’s "Beyond Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience" traveling exhibit, you’re in luck. "Beyond Monet: The Immersive Experience" opened this week in Honolulu. HPR’s Zoe Dym shares what to expect.

Over the weekend, the Hawaiʻi Convention Center hosted its first full-capacity event since the pandemic began. HPR’s Zoe Dym attended Kawaii Kon 2022, the largest anime convention in Hawaiʻi, and spoke to attendees dressed up as their favorite fictional characters.

State agencies have used the Hawaiʻi Convention Center for nearly two years to meet increased workloads in response to the pandemic. Those expanded efforts are winding down and restrictions for large managed events have eased, allowing the building to host conferences, conventions and meetings.

The Hawaiʻi Tourism Authority plans to seek $64 million from the state’s capital improvements budget to fix a leaky rooftop deck at the Hawaiʻi Convention Center. The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reports that’s more than double what the agency had last anticipated it would cost to complete the largest deferred maintenance project at the building, which opened in 1998.

If you live on O‘ahu, you may be wondering whether to buy tickets to “Beyond Van Gogh,” the multimedia exhibition based on the work of impressionist painter Vincent Van Gogh. HPR's Noe Tanigawa offers a look inside the exhibit.

Visitors are slowly returning to the islands as restrictions begin to ease, and more people receive a vaccine. While leisure travel is making a comeback,…