They said mountains were formed by geology alone. Then the comparisons started circulating — massive flat-topped formations, ring patterns in stone, and shapes that look exactly like cut tree trunks on a scale we were never taught existed. Old maps show them. Modern photos still match. Were these once living giants… or is the resemblance just coincidence? #GiantTrees# #LostCivilizations# #ForbiddenHistory# #AncientStumps# #Unexplained# #HiddenWorld# #Tartaria#

What causes stagnation in the built world is one of the key questions of our era. In this month’s @WorksInProgMag, @SCP_Hughes argues quite convincingly that some of today's housing shortage is downstream of aesthetic choices. In particular, he shows that the abruptly ugly turn of postwar architecture triggered a regulatory backlash in the form of the conservation movement, which in turn stymied construction and development in urban environments across the West: It may seem tendentious to flatly declare postwar construction ugly, but survey data is quite consistent on this point. Indeed, the sentiment is so widespread that it has spawned the Tartaria conspiracy theory. While the idea that people didn’t like the modernist construction of the postwar years is not by itself a new finding, Hughes teases out the particulars of the causality and shows how this popular rejection led to ensuing stagnation. This essay builds on Hughes’s prior work (“The beauty of concrete” and “Cheap ornament and status games”), and is I think an important contribution for anyone who cares about material progress.