It's not just that, but that too. E.g. a cottage like this https://www.superkul.ca/projects/double-island-cottage/ vs a "traditional" cottage. I'm sure people have preferences for both, but to me this is still a beautiful design where all the examples in the article are just low cost ugly designs.

Or on the flip side, go with cheap "traditonal design" like https://mcmansionhell.com/post/809937203073581056/mctuscan-h... and no, sorry, that's ugly as sin.

I think it's true that construction in general has become cheaper over time, so comparing older buildings to newer ones often results in comparing more expensive design to cheaper design. But that's different than aesthetic. To properly compare aesthetic they should normalize for cost at least, if not also execution.

I suppose they did have the expert vs non-expert study, but the only example they showed from it had a hideous buildings in both types so I'm not sure what that's supposed to really accomplish.

> The missing part is that traditional building used to be cheap (in fact the cheapest way of building things).

This is only partially true.

Traditional building used to be cheaper than it is now, yes, but things like ornate decorations and facades were still expensive additional work. It's worth considering the survivorship bias here - the traditional buildings people know and love are the ones that were well built and cared for.

Material costs changed too. Hardwood slats over a raised perimeter foundation used to be the cheapest way. Nowadays that would be a premium build.