I kinda like urban 1930's-1940's design, but I'm not a fan of ornament. I like the streamlined, clean lines. But given the times, many of the layouts were less lavish, and ceiling heights started shrinking.
The superprime stretch of Fifth along the Park has a ton of 1930's-1940's buildings. I prefer, say, 880 Fifth, over its predecessor and successor neighbors:
https://www.google.com/maps/@40.7708...7i16384!8i8192
But yeah, there wasn't a lot of high density development in most of urban America, really from 1929 till the early 1950's.