Extreme Ironing

Iron creased shirts in the most extreme settings imaginable — mountain summits, underwater, mid-freefall.

👥1 per team🌤outdoor

What is Extreme Ironing?

Extreme ironing is an English performance-art sport invented in 1997 by Leicester knitwear-factory worker Phil Shaw. Participants carry an ironing board and iron to an extreme location — a mountain summit, underwater, a canoe on rapids, atop a skydiver mid-freefall — and iron creased shirts. The Extreme Ironing World Championships were held in Munich in 2002.

Quick facts

Category

Adventure & Extreme Sports

Type

Individual

Players

1 per team

Where played

outdoor

Country of origin

🇬🇧 United Kingdom

Estimated origin

1997, Leicester, England (Phil Shaw)

Olympic

No

Popularity

niche

Sources & provenance

Last verified 2026-08-24.verified