Mike Swanson
e80c36e6bf
Author: Mike Swanson Machine: DESKTOP-0O8A1RL Timestamp: 2026-05-22 11:07:55
160 lines
8.1 KiB
Markdown
160 lines
8.1 KiB
Markdown
# Typography
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## Classic Typography Principles
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### Vertical Rhythm
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Your line-height should be the base unit for ALL vertical spacing. If body text has `line-height: 1.5` on `16px` type (= 24px), spacing values should be multiples of 24px. This creates subconscious harmony; text and space share a mathematical foundation.
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### Modular Scale & Hierarchy
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The common mistake: too many font sizes that are too close together (14px, 15px, 16px, 18px...). This creates muddy hierarchy.
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**Use fewer sizes with more contrast.** A 5-size system covers most needs:
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| Role | Typical Ratio | Use Case |
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|------|---------------|----------|
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| xs | 0.75rem | Captions, legal |
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| sm | 0.875rem | Secondary UI, metadata |
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| base | 1rem | Body text |
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| lg | 1.25-1.5rem | Subheadings, lead text |
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| xl+ | 2-4rem | Headlines, hero text |
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Popular ratios: 1.25 (major third), 1.333 (perfect fourth), 1.5 (perfect fifth). Pick one and commit.
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### Readability & Measure
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Use `ch` units for character-based measure (`max-width: 65ch`). Line-height scales inversely with line length: narrow columns need tighter leading, wide columns need more.
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**Non-obvious**: Light text on dark backgrounds needs compensation on three axes, not just one. Bump line-height by 0.05–0.1, add a touch of letter-spacing (0.01–0.02em), and optionally step the body weight up one notch (regular → medium). The perceived weight drops across all three; fix all three.
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**Paragraph rhythm**: Pick either space between paragraphs OR first-line indentation. Never both. Digital usually wants space; editorial/long-form can justify indent-only.
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## Font Selection & Pairing
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The tactical selection procedure and the reflex-reject list live in [reference/brand.md](brand.md) under **Font selection procedure** and **Reflex-reject list** (loaded for brand-register tasks). The rest of this section covers the adjacent knowledge: anti-reflex corrections, system font use, and pairing rules.
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### Anti-reflexes worth defending against
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- A technical/utilitarian brief does NOT need a serif "for warmth." Most tech tools should look like tech tools.
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- An editorial/premium brief does NOT need the same expressive serif everyone is using right now. Premium can be Swiss-modern, can be neo-grotesque, can be a literal monospace, can be a quiet humanist sans.
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- A children's product does NOT need a rounded display font. Kids' books use real type.
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- A "modern" brief does NOT need a geometric sans. The most modern thing you can do is not use the font everyone else is using.
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**System fonts are underrated**: `-apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", system-ui` looks native, loads instantly, and is highly readable. Consider this for apps where performance > personality.
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### Pairing Principles
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**The non-obvious truth**: You often don't need a second font. One well-chosen font family in multiple weights creates cleaner hierarchy than two competing typefaces. Only add a second font when you need genuine contrast (e.g., display headlines + body serif).
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When pairing, contrast on multiple axes:
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- Serif + Sans (structure contrast)
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- Geometric + Humanist (personality contrast)
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- Condensed display + Wide body (proportion contrast)
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**Never pair fonts that are similar but not identical** (e.g., two geometric sans-serifs). They create visual tension without clear hierarchy.
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### Web Font Loading
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The layout shift problem: fonts load late, text reflows, and users see content jump. Here's the fix:
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```css
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/* 1. Use font-display: swap for visibility */
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@font-face {
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font-family: 'CustomFont';
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src: url('font.woff2') format('woff2');
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font-display: swap;
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}
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/* 2. Match fallback metrics to minimize shift */
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@font-face {
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font-family: 'CustomFont-Fallback';
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src: local('Arial');
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size-adjust: 105%; /* Scale to match x-height */
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ascent-override: 90%; /* Match ascender height */
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descent-override: 20%; /* Match descender depth */
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line-gap-override: 10%; /* Match line spacing */
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}
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body {
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font-family: 'CustomFont', 'CustomFont-Fallback', sans-serif;
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}
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```
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Tools like [Fontaine](https://github.com/unjs/fontaine) calculate these overrides automatically.
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**`swap` vs `optional`**: `swap` shows fallback text immediately and FOUT-swaps when the web font arrives. `optional` uses the fallback if the web font misses a small load budget (~100ms) and avoids the shift entirely. Pick `optional` when zero layout shift matters more than seeing the branded font on slow networks.
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**Preload the critical weight only**: typically the regular-weight body font used above the fold. Preloading every weight costs more bandwidth than it saves.
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**Variable fonts for 3+ weights or styles**: a single variable font file is usually smaller than three static weight files, gives fractional weight control, and pairs well with `font-optical-sizing: auto`. For 1–2 weights, static is fine.
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## Modern Web Typography
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### Fluid Type
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Fluid typography via `clamp(min, preferred, max)` scales text smoothly with the viewport. The middle value (e.g., `5vw + 1rem`) controls scaling rate (higher vw = faster scaling). Add a rem offset so it doesn't collapse to 0 on small screens.
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**Use fluid type for**: Headings and display text on marketing/content pages where text dominates the layout and needs to breathe across viewport sizes.
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**Use fixed `rem` scales for**: App UIs, dashboards, and data-dense interfaces. No major app design system (Material, Polaris, Primer, Carbon) uses fluid type in product UI; fixed scales with optional breakpoint adjustments give the spatial predictability that container-based layouts need. Body text should also be fixed even on marketing pages, since the size difference across viewports is too small to warrant it.
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**Bound your clamp()**: keep `max-size ≤ ~2.5 × min-size`. Wider ratios break the browser's zoom and reflow behaviour and make large viewports feel like the page is shouting.
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**Scale container width and font-size together** so effective character measure stays in the 45–75ch band at every viewport. A heading that widens faster than its container drifts out of the comfortable measure at the top end.
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### OpenType Features
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Most developers don't know these exist. Use them for polish:
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```css
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/* Tabular numbers for data alignment */
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.data-table { font-variant-numeric: tabular-nums; }
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/* Proper fractions */
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.recipe-amount { font-variant-numeric: diagonal-fractions; }
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/* Small caps for abbreviations */
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abbr { font-variant-caps: all-small-caps; }
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/* Disable ligatures in code */
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code { font-variant-ligatures: none; }
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/* Enable kerning (usually on by default, but be explicit) */
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body { font-kerning: normal; }
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```
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Check what features your font supports at [Wakamai Fondue](https://wakamaifondue.com/).
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### Rendering polish
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```css
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/* Even out heading line lengths (browser picks better break points) */
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h1, h2, h3 { text-wrap: balance; }
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/* Reduce orphans and ragged endings in long prose */
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article p { text-wrap: pretty; }
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/* Variable fonts: pick the right optical-size master automatically */
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body { font-optical-sizing: auto; }
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```
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**ALL-CAPS tracking**: capitals sit too close at default spacing. Add 5–12% letter-spacing (`letter-spacing: 0.05em` to `0.12em`) to short all-caps labels, eyebrows, and small headings. Real small caps (via `font-variant-caps`) need the same treatment, slightly gentler.
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## Typography System Architecture
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Name tokens semantically (`--text-body`, `--text-heading`), not by value (`--font-size-16`). Include font stacks, size scale, weights, line-heights, and letter-spacing in your token system.
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## Accessibility Considerations
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Beyond contrast ratios (which are well-documented), consider:
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- **Never disable zoom**: `user-scalable=no` breaks accessibility. If your layout breaks at 200% zoom, fix the layout.
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- **Use rem/em for font sizes**: This respects user browser settings. Never `px` for body text.
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- **Minimum 16px body text**: Smaller than this strains eyes and fails WCAG on mobile.
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- **Adequate touch targets**: Text links need padding or line-height that creates 44px+ tap targets.
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---
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**Avoid**: More than 2-3 font families per project. Skipping fallback font definitions. Ignoring font loading performance (FOUT/FOIT). Using decorative fonts for body text.
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