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DD-SHELFERY-ADR-0001: Brand Color Palette and Typography Formally Approved

Status

approved — ratified by the Founder on 2026-07-30.

Date

2026-07-30

Context

../strategy/brand-and-positioning.md described Shelfery's color direction as "provisional, not approved" and its typography as "not yet chosen," while noting as an aside that the production app (in the shelfery implementation repository) already "implements a concrete version of this direction" — a full oklch-based light/dark token system, plus Playfair Display (headings) and Geist (body/UI) typefaces, shipped since at least 2026-07-04. This left the governance record out of date relative to a system that had been live in production for weeks, and is this venture's first-ever ADR (per ../decisions/README.md, which previously recorded no Shelfery-specific decisions). The gap was surfaced and the implemented system reviewed with the Founder in a 2026-07-30 session, alongside a first candidate logo mark (tracked separately — see brand-assets.md; not decided by this ADR).

Decision

The color palette and typography already implemented in shelfery/src/app/globals.css and shelfery/src/app/layout.tsx are formally approved as Shelfery's brand identity:

Color (light / dark):

Token Light Dark Role
Terracotta (primary) oklch(0.48 0.12 50) (≈ #A6552E) oklch(0.68 0.11 50) Primary brand color
Sage (accent) oklch(0.72 0.1 95) oklch(0.62 0.09 95) Accent
Background oklch(0.98 0.012 75) (warm off-white) oklch(0.17 0.02 55) (deep warm brown-black) Ground
Foreground oklch(0.22 0.03 55) oklch(0.94 0.015 75) Text
PWA theme color #7a4f35 #241a12 iOS status bar / manifest

Full token values (secondary, muted, destructive, chart, sidebar) are as already implemented in globals.css — this ADR ratifies that file's :root and .dark token blocks as the approved system, not a re-derivation of them.

Typography: Playfair Display for headings (h1–h3, .font-heading), Geist for body/UI text — both as already wired up via next/font/google in layout.tsx.

Design conventions already recorded in the shelfery implementation repository's docs/ai/design-principles.md — line-art iconography (never emoji), semantic colors staying within the warm family, 0.75rem radius — are reaffirmed as part of this same approved identity, not newly decided here.

Consequences

  • Resolves the contradiction between brand-and-positioning.md (provisional/not-chosen) and the shipping product (fully implemented) — the implemented system is now the ratified one, not "evidence, not approval."
  • Unblocks logo/mark work that needs a fixed, non-provisional palette to color-match against.
  • Existing emoji iconography (home hero 🥫, STORAGE_TYPE_ICONS) remains flagged as legacy to migrate per design-principles.md — this ADR does not retroactively bless it; it ratifies the line-art convention as the standard going forward.
  • Does not resolve the separate open questions of visible Devonshire Digital LLC endorsement or the logo/iconography mark itself — both remain open per ../strategy/assumptions-and-open-questions.md and brand-assets.md respectively.

Alternatives Considered

  • Replace the shipped palette with something new before approving it. Rejected — no functional or aesthetic problem was raised with the implemented system, and replacing a live production identity without cause carries real reversal cost (every screen, PWA icon, and themed asset would need to change) for no offsetting benefit.
  • Leave the governance record as "provisional" indefinitely. Rejected — letting documentation drift from a weeks-old shipping reality is exactly the kind of stale-record risk this ADR exists to close.

Follow-up Actions

  • Update ../strategy/brand-and-positioning.md's "What is confirmed vs. not" table and provisional language (done as part of this same change).
  • Create ../brand-assets.md (this venture had none) to register brand assets going forward, mirroring the company- and Devonside-Labs-level pattern (done as part of this same change).
  • Vectorize and evaluate the candidate jar-on-shelf logo mark — tracked in ../brand-assets.md as a candidate, not approved by this ADR.

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