A lower class doesn't have to live in a one-room shack to be lower class. And I don't think that the Waterfront was a "failed attempt". And with Bruma, there's not much choice in the matter, as everyone needs a home that can keep liveably warm.
Wrong. Living in a one-room shack does not make someone lower class, true, but mostly, they did. Why? Because they were poor. Because RL cities were cramped to the limit, and there was no more space for people to live in.
The Waterfront was failed because it made it look like there was only one place in the whole IC where poor people lived. It should have been the other way around, with only one or two districts for middle- and upper class.
"Liveably warm", you say. Well, all you really need is a fire place and a blanket, and you've got liveably warm. Besides, most lower class people would have had, if the had any, livestock directly connected or inside their house, making the place warmer anyway. Especially in a Nordic-influenced setting.
As for Skingrad, there's nothing wrong with a bit of unique architecture. It's not a crime.
No. But there's something wrong with calling three-storey houses "lower class", at least when they are only occupied by a single family, or even worse, one single person.
[censored], that wasn't even the point. Did you read what I wrote at all?