February 12, 2026
Walls, Wires, and WiFi Woes
The Wonder of Modern Drywall
From mud walls to drywall—now the internet wants in
TLDR: Modern drywall—factory-made gypsum boards—replaced messy plaster walls, making home building faster and flatter. Commenters are split between praising simplicity and blasting hidden pipes and wires, joking about WiFi-ready walls, and demanding bricks and picture rails get their due, highlighting how we live with what’s behind our walls.
Drywall got the spotlight as the unsung, factory‑made sheet that replaced messy, week‑long plaster jobs. But the comments instantly turned the blank wall into a battleground: one joker cheered “wall connected to wifi!”, while others rolled their eyes at smart walls. The vibe? Our most boring home surface is actually a tech debate about convenience versus common sense. Fans love that drywall is fast, smooth, and cheap; skeptics say it’s just gypsum in a paper sandwich, the most basic “invisible upgrade” we take for granted. And yes, Minecraft got name‑checked, but dirt walls stayed in history.
The strongest take came from the “open the walls” crowd: stop hiding the house’s guts. enobrev argued that pipes, wires, and ducts inevitably fail, so wrapping them in breakable panels is a maintenance nightmare. Cue threads dreaming of modular access panels and Lego-like interiors—versus traditionalists who say drywall’s low cost and noise control win.
Then came the purists. donkeybeer shouted “Ctrl F ‘brick’”, furious the history skipped bricks and concrete. Meanwhile, aaronbrethorst sparked a side‑quest: picture rails aren’t just twee décor; they’re better than poking new holes in drywall. And for DIY faithful, mcbishop dropped a handy YouTube channel. Old craft meets modern convenience.
Key Points
- •Wattle-and-daub is a millennia-old wall method using woven wood and mud, with some panels lasting centuries.
- •Plaster-and-lath, using gypsum plaster on wooden strips, dominated at the turn of the 20th century due to fire resistance but required skilled, time-intensive work.
- •Older plaster walls were fragile for mounting, prompting the use of picture rail moulding to hang items.
- •Asbestos was commonly added to plaster from the 1870s–1970s for fire resistance, later recognized as hazardous.
- •Drywall (gypsum board) is factory-made gypsum between paper sheets and became the U.S. standard by the 1950s for efficiency and consistency.