It's much harder to make an ugly cottage home with beautiful wood than it is with vinyl.
Similarly, I'd say that music has become ugly because of autotune and the like.
Nothing is stopping you from making your house out whatever it is you consider real, well, other than you are not wealthy enough to actually afford it. There are 8 billion people on this planet and if each of them goes and cuts down the old growth trees to make their cottage we just have a deforested planet which is something much less beautiful than having a house with fiberboard siding. Or would you rather going to have 4 generations of your family living with you without modern conveniences like sewer, water, and power?