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Decision records

ADR-0102 Archivo for display

Accepted2026-09-17Phase 7

Amends: ADR-0099

#Context

ADR-0099 set Big Shoulders Display, a condensed face, for the display role in every theme. Seen on the built sites, the maintainer rejected it: the condensed caps read as blunt rather than crisp. The body faces (Chivo indoors, Atkinson Hyperlegible Next in the field) stay.

#Decision

Display is Archivo in every theme. Archivo comes from Omnibus-Type, the foundry behind Chivo, so the display and body faces are drawn to one standard. It is a grotesque with a weight axis from 100 to 900, from google/fonts at the same pinned commit as the other faces, under the SIL Open Font License.

  • Fallback: Helvetica Neue, then Arial, then the system stack. The

Arial Narrow fallback went with the condensed face.

  • One axis. Archivo also ships a width axis (62 to 125) that nothing in

the system uses. The upstream file is instanced at wdth=100 before conversion, which takes the subset from 76,968 B to 29,368 B per app. The weight axis is kept whole.

  • The rules on the role hold. Display is never body copy and never below

the 24px floor (ADR-0099).

Big Shoulders Display, its licence, and its three served copies are removed.

#Consequences

  • The three apps serve 125,904 B of faces each, down from 128,456 B.
  • No scene value moves: fixtures render in the engine's metric face.
  • Case is a separate question and is not changed here.

#Rejected

  • Keeping the width axis for a condensed display cut. It would bring

back the face the maintainer rejected, at 2.6 times the bytes.

  • Inter or IBM Plex Sans. Both are crisp, but neither is drawn with

Chivo.