Thank you for so thoroughly documenting this astonishing structure.
The old Victorian homes were painted over due to getting a coating of soot from coal furnaces. Even downtown office buildings and the Queen Park buildings were black from the soot. Painting them over was one cheap method of "covering" them over.
Once coal was no longer the preferred method of heating, the air got cleaner. Then people started removing the coating of paint and/or soot. However, most older homes still had little or no insulation.
I am curious to know what if EIFS were common a century ago and earlier.
Insulbrick might be the historical eqivalent. Except you'd never see it slapped all over McMansions and much on commerical streets as it was cheap and looked terrible. (So I wonder why EIFS is so popular now.)
Thank you for so thoroughly documenting this astonishing structure.
I walk by this everyday wishing I had super human strength to peel it off with my hands.