OLYMPIC-THEMED bedspreads, sofas and cushions in the London 2012 colours have been revealed at the official ‘handover’ of the Weymouth and Portland Sailing Village.

The development at Officers Field, Portland was temporarily handed over to the London 2012 Organising Committee (LOCOG) yesterday, at an event hailed as an ‘historic moment’ for the borough.

LOCOG will now be making the final preparations ready to welcome the athletes and team officials to their accommodation for the Olympic and Paralympic Games sailing events from mid July.

A total of 84 residential units will host 700 athletes and 550 officials during the Olympic Games. Approximately half that number will use the accommodation during the Paralympic Games.

In the official ceremony where LOCOG took temporary ownership of the village, Kim Slowe, managing director of ZeroC developers shook hands with Sir Keith Mills, deputy chairman of LOCOG and said: “It’s yours, look after it.”

Sir Keith promised to return it ‘in just as an amazing condition as it is now’.

He said: “When I was asked to run the bid back in 2003, there was really only one place we believed we could hold the sailing – right here in Weymouth and Portland.

“In the early days I was the idiot who came up with the idea of putting a ship out here for the athletes to live on but we made the good choice of abandoning that idea and we’re now taking over this amazing village temporarily.

“I thank the developers for a fantastic job, the quality of workmanship is spectacular.”

He added: “These Olympians have been training for many years to compete for their countries and where they live, stay, eat and play while preparing for competition is absolutely critical.

“I think they’ll be over the moon.”

Borough Mayor Councillor Graham Winter also joined site workers and local residents at the event, where an athlete’s apartment was showcased.

He said: “It’s a historical moment. It’s a lovely development and a really good legacy for Portland.”

During the Games each house will host around eight athletes and have all facilities except a kitchen. Athletes will eat in a temporary dining hall which will be constructed on the site and have a social area in the new Chesil Cove Foundation School which LOCOG will take temporary ownership of in May After the sailing competitions have finished in September the apartments will be converted into homes with 25 per cent of the housing made available to a registered landlord for social housing needs.

All the residential units are low carbon with the heating and hot water for 58 of the homes coming from a biomass heating system and many of the houses are fitted with rainwater harvesting.