The biggest scene change in history saw our giant waterwheel survive the Industrial Revolution while our beam engines pumped and our cablenet pulled chimneys from the ground, flew 32 Mary Poppinses, reconfigured the forged Olympic rings and made a bicycling dove soar.

Each petal, inscribed with the name of the participating nation, was carried into the stadium during the athletes’ parade by a representative of each team, the purpose of the petals not being disclosed to anyone before the show, being revealed only at the moment of lighting. The complete and fully assembled cauldron finally made her debut to a TV audience of one billion, being lit by seven young athletes and providing a beautifully symbolic climax to the Opening Ceremony as the copper ‘petals’ rose into the air, coming together to form a single, united Olympic flame.