Hasta La Ideas

Dezeen Wire: a 3% drop in output from the construction industry is being cited as a major contributing factor to the UK economy re-entering recession – BBC.

A fall in public sector investment contributed to the dramatic drop in revenue from the construction industry. Output from the production industries also decreased by 0.4%, while the service sector increased by just 0.1%, with the overall economy shrinking by 0.2% in the first three months of 2012.

Those involved in construction are calling on the government to ease spending cuts in order to stimulate growth within the industry. Judy Lowe, deputy chairman of industry body CITB-ConstructionSkills, said: “”The huge cuts to public spending – 25% in public sector housing and 24% in public non-housing and with a further 10% cuts to both anticipated for 2013 – have left a hole too big for other sectors to fill.”

On industry website Construction Enquirer, Noble Francis, Construction Products Association Economics Director warned: “With new orders for construction falling 14% in 2011, the industry is likely to endure further falls near-term.”

We regularly publish reports from the RIBA that track trends in workload and confidence within the architecture industry – see all our previous stories here.

Dezeen Wire: a gymnasium in Baghdad that was designed by Le Corbusier in 1957 is to be restored – Yahoo! News

Completed in 1965 under Saddam Hussein, years after the iconic architect’s death, the Baghdad Gymnasium has fallen into disrepair following its occupation by American soldiers.

See more stories about Le Corbusier on Dezeen here.

Dezeen Wire: in an interview with Guardian journalist James Ball, technological rights campaigner John Perry Barlow of Electronic Frontiers Foundation (EFF) discusses the importance of establishing peer-to-peer frameworks of power and explains why he is forming an organisation to fund information hackers – The Guardian

Hacking culture and open-source production has been one of the hottest topics at the Salone Internazionale del Mobile in Milan this year. Listen to our interview about it with design critic Justic McGuirk from Thursday’s Dezeen Studio TV show, or see pictures from the Hacked Lab.

Dezeen Wire: the winners of the fiftieth D&AD Awards have been announced. See press release below.

See all the winning projects on the D&AD website.

D&AD Awards 2012 Yellow Pencil winners announced

There were a total of 66 Yellow Pencils awarded to the best of the world’s design, advertising and communications work at the 2012 D&AD Awards, the organisation’s fiftieth anniversary.

Significant winners were JWT Shanghai, which scooped three Yellow Pencils for its “Samsonite Suitcase” work in Press and Outdoor and JWT Melbourne, which won two Yellows for its Melbourne Writers Festival “Wi-FiCTION” campaign.

Other campaigns to win more than one of the coveted awards included LOWE/SSP3 for the Colombian Ministry of Defence, Dentsu Tokyo for Honda Motor’s “internavi”, Ogilvy Johannesburg for Multichoice/M-Net’s “MK is” campaign and Be Bravo for its work with Leica.

British publisher, Laurence King and Marion Deuchars gained two Yellow Pencils in Book Design and Illustration for “Let’s Make Some Great Art”, as did W+K London for its Kaiser Chiefs “Bespoke Album Creation Experience”.

Tim Lindsay, CEO of D&AD said: “First I’d like to thank the almost 200 judges who took part judging thousands of pieces of work this year. They have once again helped to make this the awards ‘for creatives, judged by creatives’.

“Across the board, D&AD has once again reflected the changing shape of our industry. The craft skills of making great pieces of graphic design, illustration, direct and TV and Cinema are as strong as ever.

“However, we’ve seen the tectonic shifts at play as juries in Typography, Writing for Design and Writing for Advertising commented that talent has moved out of these craft areas, attracted by emergent media in digital and mobile, where awards for these craft skills have had a strong year.”

Dezeen Wire: Swiss architecture and design publisher Birkhäuser has gone into administration just over two years after being bought out by Spanish publisher ACTAR.

All business is currently on hold until a new buyer can be found for the company, which was first founded by Emil Birkhäuser back in 1879.