IELTS Speaking for Success - 🏯 Part 2: Describe an interesting building

Episode Date: February 6, 2026

Get access to our premium episode archive: https://www.patreon.com/ieltssfs You should say: where it is, what it looks like, what function it has, and explain why you think it is interesting. Tune in and have a great day! - Book a class with Rory here: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://successwithielts.com/rory⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Our course on Phrasal Verbs: https://successwithielts.com/podcourses Transcript: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Sign up for our archive to get access to the transcript⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Find an IELTS Speaking Partner: https://links.successwithielts.com/ieltspartner Our social media: https://linktr.ee/successwithielts © 2025 Podcourses Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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The morning will begin when passenger Fisher is done celebrating. 19 plus Ontario only. Please play responsibly. Concerned by your gambling or that if someone close to you, call 1866533 or visitcomex Ontario.ca. Hello, hello, lovely and welcome into ILD Speaking Part 2. Describe an interesting building. You should say where it is, what it looks like, what function it has, and explain why you think it's interesting. Rory, tell us your story.

I'd like to talk about the Eiffel Tower, which is a pretty famous building in Paris and France. You might have seen it for yourself on TV or. in books since it's a pretty popular site to have in movies or to set the scene for something like a guidebook or a novel. When it comes to what it looks like, it's a tower, so it's a very tall building with a

high point and a base that flares out in four places. So there are four pillars of steel beams that support it. I'd say it was a pretty grey colour from what I can remember just from standing underneath it, which Makes sense since that's the color of steel, I think. Not only is it just a sort of high metal framework,

it's also a place with restaurants and viewing platforms, so you can see people enjoying themselves in those places. I've never been inside those places myself, but the views must be spectacular, just looking at it from the ground up. In terms of its function, I think it's just a tourist attraction with places for people to see the sites and enjoy their meals these days. but I think it was originally constructed for the world's fair to demonstrate how various metal frames could be used to create extremely tall buildings. I don't think that caught on France since there aren't many tall buildings there,

but it certainly helped inspire many skyscrapers that we have today, at least from what I know. And oh, at night, the whole structure lights up and sparkles from time to time, so it's even more beautiful when that happens. As for why, I think it's interesting. I think it's the combination of the iconic design and the history of the place. When you look at it, it immediately evokes all this imagery of construction and the effort

that people put into it, and you immediately know where you are and what you're looking at. It's hard to imagine what the world would look like if we didn't have it, even though it's in a very different country to my own. And what about your friends? Do they enjoy this building? The ones that I have talked to about, I'll approve of it, yeah. Move activated. The scorebed app here with trusted stats and real-time sports news.

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You can talk about a famous building, like Rory, who told us the story about the Eiffel Tower. And Rory, it's like, Eiffel, are you Eiffel? Well, I think in French it's called the Tour, or La Turifel. But in English, it's the Eiffel Tower. Eiffel, yeah, the Eiffel Tower. You can steal Rory's story, DeLisna, and talk about the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Hey, even if you haven't seen it. Or you can talk about, I don't know, some museum in your city or a building you like.

But you should be able to describe the building and we do need specific words, okay? But it's good to pick one that we're pretty familiar with. And building could be, I don't know, a house, another house. a house where people live or an administrative building where the government stays and works. And we start off with I'd like to talk about the Eiffel Tower or about the building I have next to my house, for example, or a shop, a restaurant, a museum building, which is a pretty famous building in Paris, in France, and I've seen it many times, or I haven't seen it myself in Paris. It's a pretty popular site.

Site like place. Oh, thing that you see. Yeah, something you see. And really, like, the Eiffel Tower is on lots of postcards, it's everywhere. So it's a pretty popular place. When it comes to what it looks like, we describe the appearance of the building. We just describe the building. We use adjectives and descriptions, right?

So the question is like, what does it look like? Like describe it, describe the building. And we can make a link when it comes to what it looks like. It's a tower. So it's a tall building or it's a museum building. It's a four-story building? But if we, well, four stories is like four floors. But the Eiffel Tower are talls.

the Eiffel Tower. Three hundred meters tall, it's quite tall. But if your building has like two stories or like two floors or five floors, you can say that it's a five story building. Not story like a good story, well done, but floors, right? So it has five floors or it's a five story building. And there are four pillars of steel beams that support it. So it kind of stands on four pillars, on four kind of legs, the Eiffel Tower.

Then we mention the color. So it's grey or it has black and red colors. Although what we should say is not its grey color or it's blue color. We just say the color, it's blue or it's gray. If we want to use the word color, then we want to say it's blue in color or it's gray in color. it's gray in color, but usually we don't need to do that. Then Rory uses inversion, dear listener. Wow.

So he says, not only is it metal, but it's also a place with ta-da-ta. So you can say like, not only is it a museum, but it's also a library. So pretty much we connect two sentences. It's a museum, it's a library. Not only is it a museum, but it's also a library. So you can write it down and make a sentence about your building. Or just talk about the Eiffel Tower. Seriously, it's the easiest, I think, approach.

Just still Rory's story. So the tower has restaurants and viewing platforms. Like for tourists where you just go up there and you admire, the view. So it's called a viewing platform where people enjoy themselves looking at Paris. And then you can say, like, I've never been there myself, but the views must be spectacular. Spectacular, like, wow, something like, whoa, wow, so nice, spectacular, amazing views. I've been on the Eiffel Tower and, yes, the views are amazing. Oh, have you been on the Eiffel Tower or have you been on the Eiffel Tower or have you been?

been in the Ico power. Inside, but I've been inside the Eiffel Tower, but also I visited one of the platforms. Oh, how was it? Lovely, I enjoyed it. Lots of people, but I really enjoyed it. Just like, I felt the power of this building, you know, this like, wow, this massive structure. And, yeah, the views are spectacular, amazing. It certainly looks like that. I've only ever seen, you're very lucky. seen it from the ground up, so I don't know about these other things. This winter, we are cheering for our home nations, but your story might stretch far beyond one flag. With ancestry DNA, you can discover all the places from your family's past. Now, up to $65 off for a limited time. Explore the cultures that shaped you across more than

3,600 regions worldwide. More pride, more connection, more to cheer for. Start your journey with Ancestry DNA. Today, sailings February 19th terms apply visit ancestry.ca for more details. When you start speaking about the function, you can say in terms of its function, it's just a tourist attraction. So, a place for tourists now, right? It was originally constructed for the world's fair. So the passive voice, it was constructed 10 years ago, or it was originally built 20 years ago, as a museum,

or as a library. And actually, there's a film about the person who built it. A very interesting film, I'd recommend it. Who was the person that built it? Obviously, Mr. Eiffel, but what was his first name? Oh, the first name? I don't know, but the film is called the A-Fo.

I'm going to say it's Charles. Maybe I'm wrong. Hold on. I'm so happy. I'm just looking at the page now, and I was totally right, The Eiffel Tower is 330 meters tall. But it was Gustav, I fell, who built it? And it was for the World's Fair in 1889.

Wow. 1889, yeah. And people hated it when he first built it, of course. Yeah. And the building inspired people to build skyscrapers, right? Because the tower was pretty tall for its time. So some people got inspired by it. and the whole structure lights up at night.

So if there are lights on the building, you can say the whole, like all of the structure, the whole structure lights up at night. And you can say it sparkles, because the Eiffel Tower sparkles nicely. You know, it's just like this with the lights. It's very pretty. So it's even more beautiful at night than during the day.

Why is it interesting? And we can say that it's the combination of the design and history. So what makes any building interesting? It's the combination, the mix, the connection of its design, the design of the building, and the history of the place. And here you can say the iconic design. Because, well, the Eiffel Tower does have an iconic. design, this famous, popular design, iconic.

Something that defines a place. And when you look at it, like, it evokes what feelings? So you can say, like, when you look at it, people feel amazed, people start thinking about the history, the creator of the building, yeah? Gustav. Gustav, yes, thank you, Gustav. And you think about the effort that people put. into it. A lot of people

put a lot of effort into building this structure, construction, or inter designing this building. Yay! So Rory, what adjectives did you use? Because deal is now when you describe something, yeah, adjectives.

Let's talk about them for a building in general, first of all. For example, we could say a pretty famous building as opposed to pretty interesting. And then a pretty popular site or just a popular site and then we can talk about if it's a tall building or a short building or if you want to use those things but you're talking about something that's maybe not famous you could say it's not very famous or it's not a very popular site so you can still do that

then we already talked about the color it's gray blue which is the color of and then we can talk about the views of the building which are spectacular for the ivled tower but if we want to use it for a different building that's not so spectacular, then we say it's not spectacular, unfortunately. But it is still interesting. Then for the Eiffel Tower, these are no adjectives, but they are verbs. It lights up, it sparkles. And it's even more beautiful. Then how else to describe it?

Oh, what else? Oh, iconic, yes. Iconic, yeah, iconic design. It has iconic design. We can also say that it's a historic building. It's a historic museum. So it's old, right? So it's historic.

You can also say that it's impressive. It's beautiful. An impressive building. Then you can comment on the style of the building, like Gothic, for example, a Gothic building. A modern structure, if it's modern, in modern style. Roman building. Maybe you will talk about ancient. building, something very old, it's ancient.

Okay. Media listener. Super. A very specific topic today. Please make a choice about what building you're going to talk about. And we'll get back to you in our speaking part three about buildings, architecture, and historical sites. All right? Bye.

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Choose news, not noise. CBC News. Describe an interesting building. You should say, it is, what it looks like, what function it has, and explain why you think it's interesting. I'd like to talk about the Eiffel Tower, which is a pretty famous building in Paris and France. You might have seen it for yourself on TV or in books since it's a pretty popular site to have in movies or to set the scene for something like a guidebook or a novel.

When it comes to what it looks like, it's a tower, so it's a very tall building with a high point and a base that flares out in four places. So there are four pillars of steel beams that support it. I'd say it was a pretty grey colour from what I can remember, just from standing underneath it, which makes sense since that's the colour of steel, I think. Not only is it just a sort of high metal framework, it's also a place with restaurants and viewing platforms, so you can see people enjoying themselves in those places. I've never been inside those places myself, but the views must be spectacular, just looking at it from the ground up. In terms of its function, I think it's just a tourist attraction with places for people to see the sights and enjoy their meals

these days, but I think it was originally constructed for the World's Fair to demonstrate how various metal frames could be used to create extremely tall buildings. I don't think that caught on France, since there aren't many tall buildings there. But it certainly helped inspire many skyscrapers that we have today, at least from what I know. And oh, at night, the whole structure lights up and sparkles from time to time. So it's even more beautiful when that happens. As for why, I think it's interesting.

I think it's the combination of the iconic design and the history of the place. When you look at it, it immediately evokes all this imagery of construction and the effort that people put into it. you immediately know where you are and what you're looking at. It's hard to imagine what the world would look like if we didn't have it, even though it's in a very different country to my own. And what about your friends? Do they enjoy this building? The ones that I have talked to about, I'll approve of it, yeah.