Midnight Essays

Midnight Essays is a reading environment first and a website second. It takes its cues from the literary quarterlies of the mid-century, the paper-white-on-ink night modes of good e-readers, and the warmth of a single reading lamp in a dark room. The canvas is a deep ink-blue rather than black, which is gentler on eyes at night; the type is a warm parchment tone, not white. There is no photography: the essays and their titles are the imagery, set in a beautiful text serif at book sizes with footnotes, reading times and word counts as the only decoration.

Principles

• Optimise for forty minutes of reading, not for a five-second scan.
• Warm text on cool dark: never pure white on pure black.
• Type is the image — no photographs, no illustrations.
• Show word counts and reading times; they are a promise.
• One amber mark per screen, like a lamp in a dark room.

Motion

A thin amber reading-progress line grows along the top edge as you scroll. Text blocks fade up 10px as they enter, slowly, like eyes adjusting to lamplight.

Do & don't