>Message text written by "BP - His DNA is this long."
>>Unfortunately all of these paradigms shifted when the stars of mass
>production
>and mass marketing aligned. Standards for construction as well as standards
>for tradesmen began to lower as the availability of cheaper (litteraly)
>materials and systems increased. <
>
>At the risk of attracting loads of semi-fermented fruit being hurled in my
>direction (by the way, fermentation is the world's oldest chemical process)
>I will play devil's advocate on this issue of "the good old days" of great
>workmanship.
>
>First of all, I see nothing wrong with standardization.

Neither do I.  What I do see is the lowering of standards in design.  I can
design well with standardized parts, or I can design poorly.  I can apply
standardized parts in awfully unstandardized ways, too.

>Now, here comes the rotting fruit. With regard to tradesman, I would
>suggest that the goal of all of us who work in the area of technological
>development is to eliminate or reduce to the absolute minimum society's
>reliance on craftsmanship. And I would argue that most tradesman like it
>that way.

Sadly, I'm afraid you are correct.  The problem that I am seeing is that
all of the tradesmen have gone this way, and thus we have an inadequate
supply of craftsmen in a field (preservation) that has a micro-nanometric
amount of value in the overall economic output of construction in this
country...we don't have enough craftsmen for even a piddling amount of
work, relatively speaking.  Head and hand, head and hand.  We have gone the
way of amputation, having cleaved off the head, and now we must have Betty
Crocker illustrated cookbook instructions to guide the illiterate in the
application of goo on stone.  Which they fail to follow since they don't or
can't read, and then the fingerpointing starts as to why the goo isn't
staying on.

>A mass-produced nail is better than a hand made nail. It's cheaper, more
>consistent and can be held to a tighter standard. The price and quality of
>nails today don't prevent anyone from building anything they choose to
>build. Society benefits. Save the craftsmanship for the endeavors that
>warrant craftsmanship. Let's face it-- we all want cheaper and better, and
>we just have to make sure we are good consumers so that we actually get
>what we bargained for.

Your last point is the critical one, absolutely central to this whole
discussion.  And really my lament.  My feeling is that the consumers are
not "good," or discriminating in many ways (life is a whirlwind, who has
time to check it all out?).  I think life warrants craftsmanship, for my
quality of life.  So few individuals seem to share that view.  I agree that
there is a place for the Butler Building metal shell.  Way, way, way in the
back of the industrial park.  Regretably, they are being constructed on the
entryway highway into my town, as an office building, with a neo faux
mansard wedgy that has been Mr. Potato-headed onto the upper edge of the
front of the box, supported by the cylindrical fiberglass classical
toothpicks on the outside corners.

Bleach.

_______________________________________________
Dan Becker,  Executive Director       "Conformists die, but
Raleigh Historic                                 heretics live on forever"
Districts Commission                                   -- Elbert Hubbard

[log in to unmask]