Manhattan, Soho, right down town. What's so interesting about this streetscape? The house on the left is brick masonry. The house in the middle is painted brick masonry. The house on the right is stucco over brick masonry. Better and better water control from left to right. Owners figure things out.

I love New York. Especially the parts that are "aging gracefully". What's so interesting about this streetscape? The house on the left is brick masonry. The house in the middle is painted brick masonry. The house on the right is stucco over brick masonry. Better and better water control from left to right. Owners figure things out. Now look at Prague, Czech Republic. The house on the right is brick masonry. The house on the left is stucco over brick masonry. As brick and stone buildings get old they leak. So how do we handle it? We try repointing the brick first. Then we paint over the brick. And then at the end we stucco over the brick. We do this all over the world. As buildings age we repoint them, paint them and then stucco them. In many parts of the world we preserve and save old buildings by stuccoing them. The historic folks on this side of the ocean just had a heart attack reading this. The good news is most normal people ignore those folks. Not everything ever built is historic. Just cause you are old does not make you historic.