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Quiet Circle Design System

Design system ยท 2026-05-18

A flexible template for organizations that sit with loss.

Quiet Circle is one design system for miscarriage, pregnancy loss, and infant loss nonprofits. Three palette variants, faith framing on or off, and a fixed page structure built for a visitor who is grieving. Not a clone of any one org.

Open the foundations → See the homepage

What's in here

Eight files. One system. Every page is standalone, open and view in a browser.

brand-spec.md

The source narrative. Tone, palette rules, faith on/off, the four flex points, microcopy, anti-patterns, imagery rules, privacy posture.

palettes.json

Three palette variants: oatmeal-warm (default), sage, dusty-blue. Plus type pair, scale, radius, and quick-exit defaults.

_shared.css

Tokens, base typography, components, and the four flex-point CSS switches that drive faith / stories / palette / primary path without forking HTML.

design-system.html

The visual reference. Every palette swatch in all three variants, type scale, buttons, cards, pull-quotes, the quick-exit, the footer. Next turn.

sections.html

The section library: quiet acknowledgment, primary path, what we offer, newly grieving, for supporters, faith disclosure, stories, quiet giving, footer. Next turn.

homepage.html

A complete sample homepage demonstrating the fixed scroll order with default flex points. Next turn.


The four flex points

Every build configures these on the <html> element. Nothing else changes.

data-palette

oatmeal-warm · sage · dusty-blue.
Picks the accent family. Background stays warm cream across all three.

data-faith

off · on.
When on, the homepage discloses the faith framing. No bait-and-switch.

data-stories

omit · include.
The Stories section renders only with permission-cleared content. Never half-built with placeholders.

data-primary-path

read-newly-grieving · find-group · comfort-box · speak-peer.
Picks the hero CTA verb to match what the org actually offers.


When to reach for Quiet Circle

Pick Quiet Circle whenever the org does not have a strong existing visual identity, or when the build should establish one from scratch. The system handles the heavy lifting of a register that is unusually easy to get wrong. Visitors are grieving, and a single misjudged image or microcopy choice can break the trust that the rest of the site has to earn.

For organizations with an established brand worth preserving (their own logo, photography, palette that matters), use a client-specific design system instead. The sibling replicas rtz-hope and tommys are examples of that pattern.

Do not pick Quiet Circle for