Sublime
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An agrarian surplus sustained urban elites and their elaborate high culture. In the towns, an artisan class of legendary skill had sprung up to cater for these elites’ material demands.
John Darwin • After Tamerlane: The Rise and Fall of Global Empires, 1400-2000
My claim is that luxury goods are gradually becoming a noisier signal of one's position in society. This isn't to say that they don't still confer status — they clearly do. People still buy material items to signal their status. But because they've become a noisier signal over time, people are starting to signal their status with their beliefs and ... See more
The Profile Interview: Author Rob Henderson on Why We Hold ‘Luxury Beliefs’ and Develop ‘Status Anxiety’
Much of leisure, for the aspirational class, has become productive.
Elizabeth Currid-Halkett • The Sum of Small Things: A Theory of the Aspirational Class
Zoning is losing its power. New ventures are able to reach a meaningful scale before regulators (and competitors) react. The boundaries between different uses are blurring, with people lodging in apartment buildings, living in hotels, working in restaurants and retail malls, and sleeping or socializing at the office.
Dror Poleg • Dror’s Substack | Substack
Today, material goods are plentiful but their ability to reveal or enable social mobility is increasingly limited. There is no longer a dominant leisure class; in its place the aspirational class is rewriting the patterns of consumption while simultaneously disengaging in conventional material conspicuous consumption.
Elizabeth Currid-Halkett • The Sum of Small Things: A Theory of the Aspirational Class
