Royal College of Art Torchbearers Carry Olympic Flame Through Final Stages

Rector Paul Thompson, SU Vice-President Andrew Lacon and four students from Innovation Design Engineering – Ben Alun-Jones, Jonathan Fraser, Amrita Kulkarni and Julene Aguiree Bielschowsky – will be among the 8,000 torchbearers to have carried the flame across the UK to its final destination of the London Olympic stadium.

Since its arrival from Greece on 18 May, the flame, which symbolises peace, unity and friendship, has journeyed around the UK reaching as far as the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands.

The torch will pass through Hackney on Saturday, before reaching Bexley on Sunday, and journeying through Lewisham and Wandsworth on Monday. It will then pass through Camden and Westminster, finally reaching Stratford on 27 July.

The ceremony of carrying the Olympic flame, the torch and the relay has roots in the rituals of the Ancient Greek Games. A flame on the altar of the goddess, Hera, burned throughout the ancient Games, while messengers, travelling throughout the country, declared an official truce.In the modern Games, the Olympic flame is lit from sun’s rays at the temple of Hera in Olympia, and follows a relay around Greece, before being handed over to the host city at a ceremony in Athens.

In the host country, it charts a path through as many areas as possible, passing from one torchbearer to another, before reaching the Olympic cauldron. It is the cauldron that stays lit throughout the Games and is extinguished at the end of the closing ceremony.

Rector Paul Thompson said: ‘It is a real honour for staff and students of the Royal College of Art to be selected as torchbearers – not least, because the torch itself was designed by our former students, Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby.'