New Blog Updates and Patreon Rewards for 2020!!!!

Howdy folks! 

Patreon has really evolved over the years and the landscape of how creators can interact with their patrons has changed dramatically - expanding to such areas as merch, exclusive servers, instagram-like story features, and newsletters. 

That's why I've taken the opportunity to expand my Patreon to be more interactive with you, the patrons who make this project possible. 

First off, we're going to start with what's coming on the blog in the year 2020:

McMansion Hell enters bi-monthly status

As many of you are aware, this blog has been, well, flaky, as I try to balance my career as a freelancer, speaker, and educator with my career as a blogger. Instead of random updates, this blog will be set to publish twice a month, the first post being a house roast and the second post being a series post, such as the series on Brutalism. This allows time for freelancing, devoting more time to Patreon, and creates a consistent expectation of what bang you'll get for your buck. 

New House Roasts, Year By Year

Do you ever wonder how McMansions got the way they did? We'll we're about to find out. Now that we've completed the 50 States of McMansion Hell, I'm going to be selecting one house for every year from 1970 to 2018 that is emblematic of the design trends of its time - in house-roast form, of course. 

New and Continuing Series

The Brutalism Post will see three more installments this year. It will be followed by a new, five-post series on Postmodernism and its trials, tribulations, and legacy. 

Results from the 2019 Gingerbread Contest will be announced next week!

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New Patreon Rewards and Tiers

In order to take advantage of all the different goodies Patreon now has to offer, the tiers have been totally revamped: 

$1 - League of Architectural Wokeness

• Access to Patron-only feed
• Access to the Good House of the Month - the antidote to the month's house roast.
• NEW: Access to the Discord server. Many people I know who are also on patreon have had great success with having a Discord server, "McMansion Hell Chat" just for patrons. This will have channels for sharing McMansions, architecture news, urbanism/housing hot takes and more in order for all of us to get together and share cool stuff as a community. 

$3 - League of Architectural Sassiness

• All previous rewards
• NEW: Access to a new weekly newsletter: "McMansion Hell's This Week in Design" - I'm super excited about this project, which is taking place via Goodbits. Every week, subscribers will get a curated list of the goings on in the world of architecture, design, urbanism, housing and more, with commentary by yours truly. It's going to be really fun. The first installment rolls out on Sunday! 

$5 - League of Architectural Savviness 

• All Previous Rewards
• Access to a monthly live house roasting session and Q&A on Crowdcast, which this year will feature several guest appearances by content creators, cultural critics, architecture journalists and more. 

$10 - League of Architectural Solidarity

• All Previous Rewards
• NEW: Welcome to Discourse Club, a special Discord chat and monthly discussion session that'll function as a book club - I send out articles, essays, or other tidbits and we will discuss them together as a group. If that sounds boring, trust me it won't be - it's called Discourse Club for a reason. Plus, I get to use the skills I learned teaching this past year!
• ALSO NEW: Get posts  from the Lens app on Patreon, where I'll send Instagram-like updates about  the goings on of architecture, design, and McMansion Hell. (Let's be honest, a lot of them will be buildings I like) 

$20 - Guardians of Architecture

• All Previous Rewards
• NEW: a free An Art sticker!

$30 - NEW TIER: League of Discourse Warriors

• All Previous Rewards
• NEW: free An Art Mug and Sticker!

$50 - League of Suburban Warriors

• All Previous Rewards
• Free An Art T-shirt, Mug, and Sticker

I hope that you enjoy this year of house roasts, articles, and fun new patron goodies. See you next week with the Gingerbread Contest results, a house from 1970, and the first Week In Design Newsletter.