IELTS Speaking Part 2: IELTS Cue Card/ Candidate Task Card

Describe an unusual building you have visited

: You should say

where it is
how it looks like
why you went there
and explain why you think it was unusual

: Sample Answer

Buildings are strange things, they are easy to take for granted if they are the ones you live near to and pass by every day, but some buildings are really remarkable, and not always for outwardly obvious reasons. It would be easy to pick an ‘unusual’ building that has an extraordinary external architecture, and of course, they can be remarkable, impressive and on occasion beautiful. However, the building I want to talk about is certainly unusual, unique even, but you wouldn’t necessarily know this unless you went inside

So I’ll tell you where it is and what it looks like, why I went there, and explain what it is that makes it so raresecond tallest building in the city I am told it is the tallest university building in the UK. It is known as ‘The Arts Tower’, because those are the subjects that were originally taught inside its four walls. Degrees like modern languages, philosophy and other Humanities disciplines. It is a classic 60’s tower, twenty stories high and constructed of concrete and glass. Honestly, it’s not particularly attractive – not in my eyes anyway, though it is typical of that era in architectural terms. Even so, it is something of a local landmark, because it is so high you can see it from almost anywhere in the city. It has so many glass windows that in certain lights the building seems to change colour as they reflect the light of the skies outside. It can look like burnished gold in sunset, or in the dark, when the internal lights are on, it is lit up like a Christmas Tree. I wouldn’t call it beautiful, but it is striking. However, these factors, ‘though ‘interesting’, aren’t what make the building so unusual. The reason I made a special visit to see inside it, is because of what lies within

The building was constructed with a really rare and unusual elevator. It’s called a Paternoster Lift, and before I moved to Sheffield I’d never even heard of one. They are a little tricky to describe, but I’ll have a go! Essentially, a paternoster lift is a passenger elevator which consists of a chain of open compartments (each usually designed for two persons) that move slowly in a loop up and down inside a building without stopping. Passengers can step on or off at any floor they like, but the lift just keeps moving so they have to be quick! There are no sliding doors to shut you in the elevator, you just step in the opening and stand in it until it reaches the floor you want, when you carefully step out as the chain of ‘boxes’ just carries on in slow but continuous motion. The design is pretty ancient, going back to the 1880s, so at the time they were first created they must have seemed extraordinarily innovative, but now the lift is unusual because it is such historic engineering. Very few of the lifts survive because of safety concerns – the continuous motion and open ‘doors’ means people can fall going in and out, and a few years ago someone was actually killed using one getting caught in the mechanism somehow as the compartment they were in transitioned from going up one side to going down in the loop the other at the top of the lift. Sheffield, however, has kept its paternoster lift and kept it in working order too. I think it might be the largest one in the world, at 38 separate compartments (or maybe they should be called carriages), but it is definitely the largest in the UK

I made a special visit to the building to try out the lift with a friend. In such a technological age where we take things like escalators – even flying for granted, it was a strangely unsettling experience. It actually took a little while to pluck up the courage to step into the moving platform as it passes by as you have to time your entrance quite carefully. Similarly, you need to judge it carefully getting off, too slow and there isn’t time to jump before you are taken off to the next floor, too fast and you might bump your head as the opening isn’t quite clear. There is a definite knack to it! It was like travelling back in time, you could imagine people in Victorian times in England being astonished at such extraordinary technology, it is impressive now – it must have been mind-blowing then

So I think this building is unusual because it contains a piece of living history. A working paternoster lift that is possibly unique in size, and certainly extremely rare. The building also has a couple of conventional elevators now, as well as stairs for people to use. However, the paternoster lift is still there, turning slowly, and it is quite fun to have a ride, like travelling back in time on an ancient fairground ride! The building is also a rather literal reminder that you shouldn’t make assumptions only by what is most obvious – you just wouldn’t know from the unpromising exterior of the Arts Tower what lies within! Sometimes if you look beneath the surface a little, very remarkable things emerge. Hence the saying ‘don’t judge a book by its cover