Recursive Nesting — Design Sample 290

The Outer Page

Chapter one · Frame

Every page contains a smaller, truer copy of itself.

We stopped designing sequences of screens. A page that explains recursion by scrolling is a page that lied about its subject. So the article lives inside its own illustration: read the column, then look right — the next chapter is already printed there, at four-fifths the size.

The Same Room, Smaller

Chapter two · Ratio

A ratio is a promise kept at every size.

Type, padding and radius are all declared in em, so one factor — 0.795 — governs the whole descent. Nothing is redrawn for the smaller frame; it simply inherits and shrinks, the way a coastline does.

Detail Falls Away

Chapter three · Loss

Below a threshold, prose becomes texture.

Each level drops one layer of information: first the body text, then the tags, then the footer rule. What remains is the silhouette of the layout — enough to recognise, too little to read.

Silhouette

Chapter four

Shape without sentence.

Threshold

Chapter five

Almost a mark.

The Seed

scale 0.632depth 02

scale 0.795depth 01

scale 1.000depth 00 · ABYME issue 06

Depth	Chapter	Nominal scale	Survives at size
00	The Outer Page	1.000	Everything
01	The Same Room, Smaller	0.795	Body text, tags
02	Detail Falls Away	0.632	Headline, one tag
03	Silhouette	0.502	Headline only
04	Threshold	0.399	Title bar
05	The Seed	0.318	The emblem

ABYME·