Ooh, this does remind me that I need to figure out mass-culture and highbrow design values before modernism, since I indeed might apply modern thinking where it doesn't belong, sometimes. I vaguely know that it was ‘more stuff = rich’ in the middle ages, leading to the ridiculous outfits of the aristocracy, but not sure when it switched to pure modernist ‘lots of empty space = rich’ (https://i.pinimg.com/originals/67/87/56/678756c714c2bd405964...).