STAGE One Creative has continued its 14-year association with the Olympic Games after providing its expertise for the opening ceremony of this year’s Pyeong Chang Games.

The Tockwith-based creative manufacturing specialist was commission to install and operate the aerial flying system for Friday’s ceremony, which marked the opening of the Winter Olympic Games in South Korea.

Stage One won the contract in summer last year, and since then has designed and installed a flying system comprising 14 winches and steel wire cable installed 50 metres above the field of play.

Mark Johnson, chief executive of Stage One, said: “Being asked to deliver Olympic Ceremony work is a tremendous privilege.

“The technology we have to offer is world class and well proven. We’ve been at every Games since Athens in 2004. However, with the eyes of the world watching, there is always an air of anticipation ahead of the show. These are, after all, live events.”

One of the largest technical challenges for the Stage One team was ensuring that the engineering remains operational in exceptionally cold conditions, with the system exposed to temperatures as low as minus forty degrees.

To cope with these conditions, the winches were enclosed in insulated shipping containers that are placed at the base of each of the large towers around the perimeter of the stadium.

The opening ceremony used augmented reality, animals and a cast of 2,000 to help deliver a message of peace.

Stage One is scheduled to deliver three more ceremonies at PyeongChang, the Olympic Closing Ceremony and both ceremonies for the Paralympic Games.

Stage One’s high-profile creative portfolio includes opening ceremonies, architectural pavilions, event environments, TV sets and stage engineering.

The company has worked on every Olympic Games since Athens in 2004. They are best known for manufacturing Wolfgang Buttress’s Hive, and Thomas Heatherwick’s iconic 2012 Olympic Cauldron.

Most recently Stage One created the set for ITV’s celebrity ice-skating competition Dancing On Ice, which began last month. The company has also created sets for the BBC Sports Personality of the Year..