Financial Times; Oct 03, 2003 A walk on the iron side By Sharon Smith
It's not easy trying to track down an extreme ironist. Asking people questions on the subject tends to elicit responses such as: "Extreme what? Ironing? You're looking for an extreme ironist? Well when you find her, send her round to our place - we've a pile of laundry here needs sorting." Or: "Extreme ironist? No, nobody I know takes in ironing." Incredulous upper lips curled this summer as I traipsed down endless driveways searching for an extreme ironist my informant said was lurking somewhere in Surrey. Or was it Sussex?
"What exactly is extreme ironing?" a waylaid man asked as he and his dog wilted politely in the sun. I reeled off the Extreme Ironing Bureau definition: "The latest danger sport that combines the thrills of an extreme outdoor activity with the satisfaction of a well pressed shirt."
In other words, doing your ironing anywhere but in front of the television. While skydiving, say, or halfway up a mountain. "Why would anyone do that?" asked the perplexed man.
"I don't know."
"Barmy," he muttered, plodding off with his dog.
Perhaps extreme ironists are barmy. I don't know. That's why I'm now knocking on doors trying to find one of the elusive band of 1,000 practitioners in the world who can enlighten me.
Pam Harris pours an ice-cold orange juice into a long, cool glass.
"Did you find me all right?" she asks.
"No trouble at all," I smile.
Harris is merely inquiring whether I located the Tatsfield, Surrey address she confirmed over the phone without recourse to endless, bad-tempered U-turns while swearing at a map. It is the polite query normal people make. And Harris does appear to be normal. So much so that if you spotted her at the cheese counter in your local supermarket you'd stand right alongside her rather than pretend to be studying tinned soups at a distance. She's a 37-year-old married woman, whose steady eye and rational sentences betray no hint of a disturbed mind.
"So why did you do your ironing inches from the edge of the Grand Canyon?" I ask.
Yes, I have found my extreme ironist.
"We were on holiday and I suddenly thought if I'm going to have a go at EI, what better place to do it? So I rang our hotel and asked if I could borrow an iron and a board," Harris says brightly. The hotel warmed up the iron and the 109°F temperature kept it hot while she pitched her board 4,500ft above sea level and set to work on her and husband David's shirts. Harris drew coachloads of gawpers, including a couple of home economics teachers who marked her ironing 10 out of 10.
However, I still can't understand why she did it.
"For the experience. The Grand Canyon is a superb place anyway. To have a bit of fun makes it even better. And I got my ironing done."
It was Harris's first attempt and admittedly tame compared with the antics of some hardened ironists.
For an idea of what it takes to make a mark in the big boy league, take a look at the website pictures for the EI Rowenta Trophy 2003. In the winning shot, Troye Wallet irons while hanging suspended from a wire strung between two rock faces above a sheer drop at Wolfberg Cracks in Cederberg, South Africa.
In another picture, a guy uses two irons while executing a handstand on the edge of the ocean in South Africa. Others go even farther - in the case of "Dive Girl", to a depth of 101m in the Blue Hole at Dahab in Egypt.
They're fabulous, awe-inspiring pictures. But other shots of people ironing on top of moving cars or while floating downriver in a tyre descend into the type of puerile pastimes that only students find amusing.
Harris, also known as "Crease", refutes the juvenile tag but agrees that there are degrees of EI: "The real enthusiasts are already into other forms of extreme sport. They'll take whatever they're into and take it that one step further to see how extreme they can be. At the other end you have people who just want to have a bit of fun making a boring household chore something more interesting."
Perhaps it is amusing to anybody with a sense of humour. I wouldn't know because I lost mine on a baking backstreet in Surrey. Or was it Sussex? I blame this on EI's founder "Steam".
If Steam had agreed to be interviewed I wouldn't have had to hunt out Pam Harris and enough of my sense of humour might have remained intact for me to almost see the amusing side of rock climbing with an ironing board stuck to your back. But no, Steam is under a strict gagging order until his book on EI comes out. There is also a DVD on its way, which Harris and husband David Painter's company, Hot Under the Collar Productions, are helping compile.
All this probably explains why the interview was not vetoed by Steam or his publicist. Another reason might be that as one of the lower ironist orders, Harris can be relied upon not to poop the potentially money-raking secrets of the big players. (It might also explain why Harris had a shot at EI at all, though she denies this).
Steam, whose real name is Phil Shaw, invented EI in Leicester in 1997. Returning home from his job in a knitwear factory, he wanted to go rock climbing but had a pile of ironing waiting to be done. He simply decided to combine the two mountains.
Some ironists take it seriously. There are few rules but for those wanting to set a record, the ironing board must be at least one metre long, 30cm wide and have legs. A real iron must be used and visible proof produced of ironing and location. The inaugural world championships held last September in Germany scored ironists for their creative ironing style as well as for their creases.
Steam takes it seriously too. Aside from his world recruitment drive in 1999 and the forthcoming book and DVD, another championship and perhaps a branded clothing range are on the cards. He is even marking it down as a future Olympic sport.
Extreme Ironing Bureau: http://www.extremeironing.com