Talk:Otto H. Kahn House/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Utopes (talk · contribs) 09:03, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

Hello! I'll be taking a look at this tonight; it looks well made so far and should be an interesting read. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 09:03, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

@Epicgenius: the GA review is up! I've been reading through this and your other work and have definitely been impressed. Now that I've been looking into the sources and content related to this House, I may try and tackle James A. Burden House as well soon. But in the meantime for this particular review, feel free to take a look and let me know if/how you'll be acting on this. Thanks! Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 22:52, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

(Never mind about James A. Burden! Looks like someone already claimed it, no worries.) Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 22:58, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

@Epicgenius:, I've now commented on all of the suggested changes, and labeled the done ones as done. It looks like two more remain, I've gone through the article again and added one more sentence of inquiry here. After that, it looks like everything else is covered. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 01:42, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. I've fixed both of these now @Utopes. – Epicgenius (talk) 02:39, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

@Epicgenius: I've gone through everything again, and with that out of the way this article looks like it meets the GA criteria. Great job on this! I believe this should be everything necessary, so I'll go ahead and proceed with the completion steps now. Who knows, might take a look at Henry Clay Frick House tomorrow, we'll see. Thanks for your timely cooperation in this matter! Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 02:49, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

Comments

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

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And here we go! It's a pleasure to be reviewing again after Ellis Island; let's see what we're working with here...

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose, spelling, and grammar): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

   "On the top stories" - which stories are the top stories? I'm assuming third, fourth, and fifth by process of elimination. This phrase is used twice in this article; it seems to be worthwhile to change the second usage of this phrase to be "On the third and fourth stories", to indicate exactly which stories have the bedrooms. In the lede, the use of the "top stories" descriptor is probably fine as it gets covered later.

   Good point. I have changed the second use of the phrase to "on the third and fourth stories" (I don't know if the fifth story had bedrooms; I only have confirmation for the third and fourth stories). Epicgenius (talk) 00:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   Thanks for the fix; I'd probably say "third and fourth" instead of "third through fourth", as it's not like there's numbers between 3 and 4 that "through" is covering. :P Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 00:53, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

    Done, looks good. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 02:43, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   "the Convent of the Sacred Heart bought it and converted the house into classrooms." - it doesn't seem to be just classrooms, based on the further information? There's also a library which existed previously. This comes up again later, but basically saying "the house now is classrooms" might be the case for many of the different rooms that exist, but not totally for the entire house.

   Oops, I have fixed that. Epicgenius (talk) 00:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

    Done Looks good to me. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 00:53, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   "At the extreme eastern end of the southern elevation is a rusticated wall, behind which are service areas." - behind which, meaning the wall? It seems that the core of this sentence is saying "at the extreme eastern end there are service areas behind a rusticated wall." Perhaps the rusticated wall is the more important part of this section which is why it's presented first with the service area mention tacked on, but the location of these two in relation to each other is not fully presented.

   The service area was behind the wall; I've clarified that. Epicgenius (talk) 00:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   I made a tweak to this as well to keep the thoughts connected, this works for me so  Done. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 00:58, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   "On the roof are several rooms that are set back from the facade." - set back how? It seems there's distance between these rooms and the border of the facade, but the use of "set back" does not make their position totally clear. How is the design? Is it close or far?

   From the limited information that's available, it is set back slightly from the street wall, no more than 10-20 feet. The fifth floor is visible from the Andrew Carnegie Mansion across 91st Street, but not from the street itself. However, this is from visual inspection (i.e. my actual visits to the neighborhood), rather than from anything mentioned in reliable sources. Epicgenius (talk) 00:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   That's fair enough, I wasn't sure if there was a better word that could be used in place of "set back" but that might just be what it is, based on this. This works well enough, so  Done. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 00:55, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   "A short driveway, behind the facade, connects the two archways and contains the house's entrance." - does "behind the facade" need to be said here? It feels like the sentence is perfectly suitable without it, and I'm not sure whether this insertion adds value to what would otherwise be "A short driveway connects the two archways and contains the house's entrance". If necessary to mention, could either be put somewhere else, or maybe just removing the commas there could be a fix. Unsure about the value here, though. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 01:42, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

    Done, looks good. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 02:43, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (reference section): b (inline citations to reliable sources): c (OR): d (copyvio and plagiarism):

   No verifiability concerns. The sources are reliable, and any challengeable statement has a relevant reference.

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

   "Despite Kahn's extreme wealth (which enabled him to be one of the Metropolitan Opera's primary donors)" - does mention of being one Metropolitan Opera's primary donors need to be included here? While suitable for an article about Otto H. Kahn (to which his involvement with the Opera is often mentioned), the opera wasn't even being discussed in the article when it was brought up here, and is the only mention of "opera" in the article's prose.

   I have removed this. The only reason I mentioned the opera was because it somehow kept popping up when I was researching for this article. Epicgenius (talk) 00:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

    Done Sounds good. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 00:56, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   "The house was decorated with paintings from Kahn's art collection, such as Vittore Carpaccio's late-15th-century portrait St. Eustace, in addition to tapestries." - this is the only mention of tapestries, which is fine as it is cited, but at the end of the sentence here it feels out of place. The rest of the sentence is describing a work from Kahn's art collection, and ends with "oh, and tapestries", somewhat. I'd recommend including this in the beginning, so that it reads like: "The house was decorated with paintings and tapestries from Kahn's art collection..." and then remove the bit at the end.

   I've done this. Epicgenius (talk) 00:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   The phrase "in addition to" is still in use, and all that seems to have been done here is to have the order swapped. Does this phrase need to be used to distinguish the "tapestries" from the "pieces of art in Kahn's collection? Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 00:48, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   Probably fine, the tapestries are not part of the collection so this makes sense in that regard.  Done as resolved. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 02:44, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   "One frequent dinner guest was the tenor Enrico Caruso, whose advice Kahn often sought." - is it important to mention that Kahn often sought his advice? Perhaps it can be rephrased for cohesiveness without a comma, but I'm leaning on the side of it not being necessary in the first place. To me I don't see a need to talk about the fact that Kahn sought ambiguous advice, when neither person is mentioned on the other's individual page. There were other names of visitors mentioned in the citation used as well, but even then I don't see the value of adding individual relationships, personally.

   I agree with you. This was something I added at the last minute, so I've removed the part about advice, since, like you said, not even the men's articles themselves mention this advice. Epicgenius (talk) 00:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   Before I start going through the remaining changes made, I wanted to ask you about this case again @Epicgenius:. With the removal of the advice, all that is left is "One frequent dinner guest was the tenor Enrico Caruso.". This is the only location where Caruso's name comes up in the article... does he even need to be mentioned at all? It seems like he's more important to Kahn than he is to Kahn's house, even if he was mentioned in the source. Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 00:45, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   Probably not. I was just giving examples of people who visited the house, but I think it can be safely removed. – Epicgenius (talk) 00:47, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   I forgot to mention that I removed this now. – Epicgenius (talk) 01:20, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

    Done Thank you! Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 01:37, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

   Remains well-written in a neutral fashion throughout the article.

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

   No edit wars to be found here!

6. It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free content have non-free use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

   Pictures and captions look great, no issues from me.

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

   This article was a great read! And even then, I may have been grasping at straws with the criticisms; please let me know how you feel about it.

   Thanks for the review Utopes. I appreciate the feedback, and I've fixed these. Epicgenius (talk) 00:36, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

   With the above improvements, this article seems to be passing. Well done! Utopes _{(talk / cont)} 02:50, 26 February 2024 (UTC)