Michael Tae Sweeney

Eileen Clancy @clancyny.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 01:46 UTC

Do you remember folks were picketing Supreme Court Justices' homes a couple of years ago? They're back! At Justice Roberts' home today.

Short thread with video on Twitter:
x.com/LiteraryMous...

19 replies 132 reposts 612 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 17:13 UTC

ya its not a 1:1 correlation and lot of built-to-last stuff has been torn down too. but in general its the solidly-built structures that stick around for kind of obvious reasons

0 replies 0 reposts 1 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 17:10 UTC

Yup, thus was it always so! Perfectly rational! bsky.app/profile/drpe...

3 replies 0 reposts 20 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 17:09 UTC

Talk to literally one person who has bought a Victorian home about it! They are notorious money pits and usually being held together with duct tape

8 replies 2 reposts 32 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 17:08 UTC

A saw a post that was specifically comparing Victorian mansions with new glass-and-concrete ones and it's like the worst possible comparison for this. Victorian houses were so badly built that the "falling apart/haunted Victorian mansion" became a trope in literature like 30 years after their heyday

3 replies 5 reposts 60 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 17:03 UTC

Ya like the Romans didn't build the aqueducts strong enough to last 2,000 years because they wanted to impress future tourists they did it because they weren't sure how strong they needed to be and so grossly overengineered the structures bsky.app/profile/lawn...

2 replies 6 reposts 56 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 17:00 UTC

Yup! Like people moan every time a brutalist landmark gets torn down - so wasteful! these structures were built to last 1000 years! - not realizing that keeping the building functional is made much more difficult by that fact! bsky.app/profile/calm...

2 replies 1 reposts 40 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 16:58 UTC

We just don't do that because it's fallen out of favor aesthetically and doesn't match with other architectural features that modern buildings include for practical reasons.

3 replies 0 reposts 38 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 16:57 UTC

3) It's true that we lost a lot of skilled craftsmen, especially bricklayers, ironworkers and sculptors (mostly during the Great Depression - a very long time ago!) but if you want to build a building that has a bunch of craft ornamentation, its still perfectly possible and not that expensive

2 replies 2 reposts 44 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 16:54 UTC

2) its true a lot of "luxury" new construction is barely distinguishable from bare-bones new construction, that's NOT true of multi-million $ modernist mansions. building an austere-looking glass and steel modernist home is often *more* expensive than an equivalent building covered in decoration

3 replies 2 reposts 58 likes

Michael Tae Sweeney @mtsw.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 03, 2024 at 16:53 UTC

Seeing some discourse about old buildings vs new buildings and like, 1) yes most old buildings are built very solidly. no that's not because they used to build every building very well, its because the 98% of buildings from 100 years ago are gone and only the well-built ones made it

11 replies 16 reposts 200 likes