[TexasKamaAina]

It’s not the material but how it’s used. That’s what I learned from reading the full article. The Parthenon is a concrete structure.

[GOPJ]

But by the later eighteenth century, pointing machines were so good that many sculptors did little work on the actual statue: sculpting was basically an art of modeling in clay, and carving was a sophisticated but largely mechanical process. Canova, Thorvaldsen, and Rodin all worked this way. The stone sculptures that adorn the centers of old Euro­pean and American cities are mostly stone copies of plaster copies of long-lost clay originals.

This part about Rodin is so depressing... now back to the article . (yes, you're right - I didn't read it to the end.) Most of the examples given of 'what's not true' is stuff I've believed for years. There should have been a bigger tease at the beginning of the piece. That said, your comment has made me curious.

[GOPJ]

In fact, budget housing is almost the only place we find it clinging on. The obvious explanation is that ornament survives in the mass-market housebuilder market because the people buying new-build homes at this price point are less likely to be influenced by elite fashions than are the committees that commission government buildings or corporate headquarters. The explanation, in other words, is a matter of what people demand, not of what the industry is capable of supplying: ornament survives in the housing of the less affluent because they still want it.

Cast stone is a cool idea - and ornamentation 'as fashion statement' makes sense. So it's Trump supporters in their McMansions that are keeping ornamentation alive? Cool. Could make a comeback.