Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Gothic Revival architecture

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure) DavidLeighEllis (talk) 00:36, 17 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

List of Gothic Revival architecture[edit]

List of Gothic Revival architecture (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs· FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

This is a list of examples of Gothic Revival architecture. With thousands of Gothic Revival churches in the USA, it's a massively broad topic, and that doesn't even consider Gothic Revival churches in other countries or Gothic Revival buildings other than churches. There's no way we can handle this in a single list, so the only way to make it a reasonable size is to give typical examples, but if we're giving "typical examples" we're never going to have firm inclusion criteria. The only way this is going to be at all a useful list is if we make it a list of lists, comparable to the List of artists page. If this were a massively long list with tons of items, this might be useful as a source for items to be copy/pasted, but chopping bits out of this page for "List of Gothic Revival buildings in COUNTRY" is going to be completely useless; someone would do better to start anew. With this in mind, this list is not a useful navigational aid in any real sense. Nyttend (talk) 22:27, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Architecture-related deletion discussions. Northamerica1000(talk) 22:51, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. Northamerica1000(talk) 22:51, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep The nominator is right that this is a highly incomplete list, and would be wholly unmanageable if it were not. There are surprising exclusions so even as a list of examples it is not satisfactory. But to assert that it is useless even as a basis for regional or country lists seem to me to be going too far, and Wikipedia is a work in progress. This is essentially an editing problem, and if local lists are started as suggested then they can be linked from here. Simply deleting this will not serve users. The opening sentence could appropriately warn that the list is far from complete. --AJHingston (talk) 10:56, 26 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Mark Arsten (talk) 01:51, 31 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment I do not see how this article is practical without recasting as a list of lists. Even if is changed to a list of notable Gothic revival buildings (posing of course criteria for inclusion problems) it would be a big list. Including every GR building in (for instance) the UK would be impossible. I believe that Gilbert Scott built over 800 GR churches. For starters. Additionally, there are buildings on the list that are not strictly GR: Strawberry Hill and Fonthill Abbey are more properly Gothick, a fashion-setting precursor to Gothic Revival proper which is a C19 phenomenon.TheLongTone (talk) 11:34, 3 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - this may be a rare case where a category would be far better than this list. Bearian (talk) 20:49, 8 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Weak keep - It may not float everyone's boat and I expect it will remain incomplete and pretty useless for many years to come. But Gothic Revival is a recognisable phenomenon and style, so a valid inclusion criteria for a list. The list obviously needs to be restricted to notable examples, in my view. If the country examples become too numerous they can always be split, or a country-specific article created. Sionk (talk) 21:25, 8 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • commentI think a category, possibly split into gothic revival by countries, much more useful than a list.TheLongTone (talk) 23:16, 8 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You mean something like Category:Gothic Revival architecture?! Sionk (talk) 00:59, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Permit me to point out that deep down in the category tree is Category:Gothic Revival architecture in New York, which has over 420 pages itself. It wouldn't at all surprise me to find a complete US list would be over a thousand entries, and the UK would certainly add hundreds more. This is on the scale of the NRHP lists, which in many of the eastern states have to be broken down by county to get them down to manageable sizes. Mangoe (talk) 16:59, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I,ve just done a little digging: looking at the British architect G. E. Street. There are four lists covering this single architects buildings (broken down by type): I haven't looked at Scott or Waterhouse, Pugin &c. A list is unmanageable if all the minor buildings are going to be included, these being ones which are not worth their own articles & therefore would not appear in a category page. I must say I find it hard to believe that there are 420 interesting Gothic buildings in New York. I'm a Londoner, and I like Gothic Revival, of which there are certainly way more than 420 examples in this city, but only a handful are truly interesting.TheLongTone (talk) 23:24, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yep! If the list article is kept the inclusion criteria will need the addition of the word 'notable', It looks like 85-90% of the current items on the list are blue-linked, but the others have no proof they exist, let alone whether they are gothic revival. Sionk (talk) 23:40, 9 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Lankiveil (speak to me) 11:03, 11 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep The page is currently just 23K and so is well within the guidance of WP:SIZE. If it should grow to become too large then this would be addressed by splitting it, not deleting it. Our inclusion and editing policies apply. Andrew (talk) 11:31, 11 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.