My riff was on the tightly-packed small houses. The point is, as obnoxious visually as the modern version is, there is a long-standing premise at work.

What you'll notice after a short time is that each resident has found a way to make their box a little different from the ones around them. Partly so they can find their own home easily, and partly, one would guess, to set themselves apart from the ticky-tack neighborhood.

My neighborhood has houses that are placed 25' back from the street, are centered on the lots, and all have masonry or stone exteriors. Anyone spending more than a few minutes here can see the five (?) floorplans that were used over and over, but that what sets them apart is different color materials to face the houses, roof colors, etc. I wonder what that neighborhood in the first photo would look like if it was all different colors. This photo turned up in a search I did last week after someone posted an interesting photo from the Italian coast. (Down the Google image search rabbit hole. . . ) These houses aren't particularly attractive, but the effect when they're all brightly painted different colors is interesting.

SRS