LONDON - Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby have been appointed as the designers of the London 2012 Olympic torch, announced the London Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) on Monday.

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Barber and Osgerby are based in Shoreditch in the London Borough of Hackney. They won a competitive tender launched last year by LOCOG and the Design Council to create the Olympic torch, along with the celebration cauldrons to be used at the lunchtime stops and evening celebrations during the Olympic Torch Relay.

The designers are also working on design aspects for the Paralympic Torch Relay that will take place between the close of the Olympic Games and the start of the Paralympic Games in August 2012.

There will be 8,000 torchbearers to carry the Olympic flame around the UK during the 70-day relay next year. The Olympic flame will arrive in the UK from Greece on 18 May 2012.

LOCOG chairman Sebastian Coe said: "95 percent of the UK population will be within one-hour journey time of the Olympic Torch Relay and we are now developing the torch which will be one of the key visual icons of the London Olympic Games."

The Olympic torch is expected to be unveiled in June 2011.