The 2026 Winter Olympics Opening and Closing Ceremonies: What You Need to Know
Organizers also plan to use the opening ceremony to highlight Italian historical figures like Leonardo da Vinci and Christopher Columbus. There will also be a tribute to fashion designer Giorgio Armani. “We will showcase Italian talent and what we do best: create beauty and excite,” says Iascone.
What to expect at the closing ceremony
The Winter Games will close on February 22 with a ceremony at the Verona Arena. The Verona Arena, the oldest sports stadium in the world, has been chosen to create a legacy for the Milan Cortina Olympics.
The organizing committee highlighted the central role of the Verona Arena in Milan Cortina’s Olympic bid. This year’s Games will also mark the first time that the closing ceremony will be held in a different venue than the opening ceremony.
The final ceremony will continue the story started during the opening ceremony, celebrating Italy and its excellence. “We want to show once again,” says Iascone, “how Italy knows how to transform aesthetics and talent into poetry.”
Entitled “Beauty in Motion,” the closing ceremony aims to evoke “the Italian spirit,” organizers say, not only of the athletes and the venues where the Games will take place, but also that of the Verona Arena itself, which, despite its centuries, still manages to host major events of international significance.
Much attention will be paid to the technological structure of the stage, which will show the Arena of Verona “as you have never seen it,” says Alfredo Accatino, president of Filmmaster and creative director of the closing ceremony.
More than 800 people, including musicians, dancers, technicians and volunteers, will participate in the closing ceremony, which will end with the traditional transfer of power ahead of the 2030 Winter Olympics, which will be held in the French Alps.
The design of the Olympic flame
As is tradition, in addition to the athletes and venues, the Olympic flame will be at the center of this year’s Winter Games, symbolically carrying the fire of Greece, where it all began, around the world.
For the 2026 Winter Games, the flame was designed to have minimal visual impact. It is sleek and metallic and has a narrow body that is slightly curved at the top, a shape intended to draw attention to the flame itself.
The journey of the Olympic flame began on November 25 with the traditional lighting in Olympia, Greece. From there he traveled to Athens, then to Italy in early December. In total, the flame’s journey will span 63 days, 60 stops, nearly 7,500 miles, touching all 110 Italian provinces.
On January 26, the torch relay arrived in Cortina, exactly 70 years after the opening ceremony of the 1956 Games in Italy. On February 6, the flame will arrive at the San Siro stadium for the opening ceremony.
The more than 10,000 torchbearers of the Olympic flame
In total, more than 10,000 torchbearers will accompany the Olympic flame across Italy. Most of them will be volunteers, but among them will also be many top Italian Olympic and Paralympic athletes, as well as champions from previous Summer and Winter Games, as well as a few celebrities, like Jackie Chan and Passionate rivalry stars Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams.
This story was originally published in CABLE Italy. It was translated from Italian.
