I don't know where people get this idea that technological advancements always bring quality improvements alongside the price cuts. The reality is almost always a trade off. Before nails, there were rich traditions of nail-less architecture in Europe, Japan, and elsewhere. These buildings are more resilient to disasters, significantly less liable to rot, are usually built so that modular pieces can be taken out and replaced without taking the whole building down, and have a whole host of other benefits.

We switched to nails not because of a quality increase but because a massive unignorable price decrease and ability to scale.

Today, if you have the money for it, you are probably looking for that leather workman to make you your handbag. It is of much higher quality than anything you can get from any currently existing factory.