LDA reassures on design centre fears

The London Development Agency is pouring cold water on rumours that the International Design Centre planned for London will be scrapped due to lack of funding.

‘We have no reason to assume this won’t go ahead,’ an LDA spokeswoman says. ‘The IDX programme is going through our approvals process, and the next phase of the business case is being prepared.’

A source close to the LDA told Design Week in August he suspected it would back out of funding the centre, and Boris Johnson’s appointment as Mayor of London could seal its fate.

Known as the IDX, the centre’s creation was first recommended in the 2005 Cox Report as a place to provide design education and other resources to designers.

The LDA paid for two feasibility reports into the centre last year, but failed to allocate funding to it following their publication.

The agency’s spokeswoman claims that, ‘A decision by our board to approve spending is expected later in the year’.