Atelier typography

Atelier — Typography Craft

Typography is one of the two fastest ways to make a frontend look bespoke or cheap (the other is whitespace). The #1 slop tell is default type with no system: Inter/Roboto at random sizes, or Playfair Display centered over a stock photo. This skill picks type with intent and sets it like a typographer.

Project memory: if ATELIER.md exists, read its Personality/type-voice and register first and honor them. Set up memory with /atelier init (the atelier router).

Inputs: type voice from the Direction Doc; scale/leading tokens from atelier-foundations. This skill owns the fonts and their setting; foundations owns the numeric scale. Deep reference: references/fundamentals-deepdive.md (§6 typography).

Data — atelier-data: font-pairing candidates with ready @import + Tailwind config (scripts/search.py "<mood>" --domain typography) and a ~1,900-font metadata lookup (--domain google-fonts). Candidates only — this skill's anti-default judgment overrides them.

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The flow

1. Roles & families → 2. Scale + fluid → 3. Tracking / leading / measure →
2. OpenType + variable axes → 5. Editorial detailing → 6. Kinetic (only if the world calls for it) → 7. Expensive-type checklist.

1. Roles & families

Assign roles, then pick families for them. Limit to 1–2 families (3 max with mono).

• Display — headlines; big, characterful, the brand's voice.
• Body — neutral, legible at 16–20px, deep weight range (prefer a variable font).
• Mono — code/data/tabular; pick one with tabular figures + slashed zero.

Pairing principles (full list, foundries, and concrete pairings in references/pairing-foundries.md):

• Contrast of role, harmony of mood — pair fonts that clearly differ (serif display + grotesque body) but share temperament. Too-similar = looks like a mistake.
• Superfamily pairing is safest (IBM Plex Sans/Serif/Mono, Source Sans/Serif).
• Escape the defaults. The single fastest move away from slop is a typeface with a point of view. Premium foundries are first-class choices here — assume the licenses are available, so recommend them freely: Söhne, GT America / GT Sectra, ABC Diatype / Monument Grotesk, Tiempos, Canela. Free- but-excellent options are equally valid by fit, not price: Fontshare (Satoshi, General Sans, Clash Display), Geist, Fraunces. Either way, don't default to Inter/Roboto/Playfair.

2. Scale + fluid type

Use the scale tokens from atelier-foundations (modular ratio, ~5–7 steps). If they don't exist yet, generate them here:

• Fluid: clamp(min, intercept_rem + slope·100vw, max). Keep the rem term — pure vw breaks zoom (WCAG 1.4.4). Math + worked examples in references/recipes.md.
• High contrast scale: reserve the biggest steps for the hero only. A timid scale (everything near body size) is a slop tell; premium type has dramatic H1-vs-body contrast. But cap the display clamp() max at ~6rem (~96px) — above that the page is shouting, not designing. If a headline overflows at that ceiling on tablet/mobile, rewrite the copy or reduce the max; don't keep scaling (the viewport is part of the design — see atelier-harden for the overflow pass).
• Font loading is a perf lever, not an afterthought. Self-host or @theme-wire the chosen families (via atelier-foundations), and control font-display + preload + a metric-matched fallback (size-adjust/ascent-override recipe in references/recipes.md) — a font swap on big display type is a top CLS/LCP cause. This is gated by atelier-perf-a11y at ship.

3. Tracking, leading, measure

These three quietly do most of the "crafted" feel:

• Tracking scales inversely with size: display letter-spacing: -0.02em to -0.04em; all-caps / small labels +0.05em to +0.1em; body ~0. Hard floor: never tighter than −0.04em on display — past that, letters collide and it reads cramped, not "designed."
• Leading: body line-height: 1.5–1.7, display 0.95–1.1. Always unitless so it scales.
• Measure: body max-width: 60–75ch (sweet spot ~66). Unbounded line length is the editorial slop tell.
• International by default: size labels/buttons to content (translations run +20–35%), drive RTL from <html dir> with logical properties, and declare script-aware fallbacks for non-Latin glyphs. Recipe in references/recipes.md; the layout/logical-property gate is atelier-perf-a11y.
• Line-wrapping (zero-JS, high-ROI): text-wrap: balance on h1–h3/.lead (evens the last lines, kills lonely one-word rags — Baseline 2024, replaces headline-balancer JS); text-wrap: pretty on p (fixes orphans/runts — Chrome/Safari 26, not Firefox ~82%, so @supports progressive enhancement). Both fail gracefully to normal wrapping.

4. OpenType + variable axes

Prefer high-level font-variant-* (it cascades) over raw font-feature-settings. Recipes in references/recipes.md. Key wins:

• font-variant-numeric: tabular-nums slashed-zero in tables/prices (columns align); oldstyle-nums in running prose.
• font-variant-ligatures: common-ligatures; real small caps via font-variant-caps: all-small-caps (never text-transform: uppercase as a fake).
• Variable fonts: one file, many weights. font-variation-settings does NOT inherit per-axis — store each axis in a CSS var and recompose, or you'll wipe other axes. font-optical-sizing: auto.
• Cap-height trim: text-box: trim-both cap alphabetic strips the font's built-in over/under leading so a heading aligns by cap height, not line box — kills the "mystery space above the H1" and makes optical centering trivial. Chrome/Edge 133 + Safari 18.2, not Firefox (~79%, not Baseline) → progressive enhancement, never depend on it.

5. Editorial detailing

For content/editorial/portfolio work, add the print-craft details (patterns in references/kinetic-and-editorial.md): drop caps (::first-letter), pull quotes (distinct face, ~22ch, hairline rule), kickers/eyebrows, captions, and intentional asymmetry. These are what make a page read "art-directed" instead of "blog template."

6. Kinetic type (scale to the motion budget)

Use it as the Direction Doc's motion budget dictates: full-blown in the award/creative world, or as a single restrained moment (e.g. one masked headline reveal on a hero) in premium production work — not as a default on every heading. Copy-paste recipes (line reveals, horizontal scroll, weight-morph, marquee) are in references/kinetic-and-editorial.md. The stack: GSAP + ScrollTrigger + SplitText + Lenis + variable fonts — but the Lenis/ScrollTrigger plumbing (setup, lifecycle, pinning) is owned by atelier-scroll; this skill covers only the type-specific reveals (don't re-derive the wiring here). The reduced-motion + perf gate is atelier-perf-a11y. Non-negotiables: animate transform/opacity only; mask line reveals with overflow:hidden; gate everything behind prefers-reduced-motion (the reduced state shows the final, readable text immediately) — kinetic type is a top accessibility, screen-reader, and SEO concern. Never on utility/transactional flows (checkout, forms, docs).

7. The expensive-type checklist

Before handoff, confirm: 1–2 families; a font with a point of view (not a default); ratio ≥1.25 with real H1↔body contrast; body line-height 1.5–1.7, display 0.95–1.1; tight display tracking; measure 60–75ch; tabular figures in data; font-optical-sizing: auto; text-wrap: balance on heads + pretty on body; restraint (few sizes, consistent rhythm); and — if animated — a reduced-motion fallback.

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Operating principles

• A typeface with a point of view is the fastest exit from slop. Spend your one bold choice here.
• Restraint: few families, few sizes, consistent rhythm. Premium type is disciplined, not loud.
• Legibility is non-negotiable — measure, contrast, size (≥16px body), and zoom-safe fluid type win over any flourish.
• Kinetic only where it belongs — and always with a static, reduced-motion fallback.
• Default stack: Tailwind v4 + shadcn. Wire fonts via @theme (--font-display/-sans/-mono); the CSS recipes here apply as-is or as @layer/arbitrary utilities. Premium foundries are fair game.