Ground-scrimmed artwork
Text printed over unreviewed artwork, scrimmed to an alpha that can be written down rather than guessed.
Hairline stat strip
A row of stat tiles joined by hairlines that are grid gap, not borders — the container paints the border color and the tiles paint the surface, so separators never double up or break when the row wraps — in a reporting form and in a second form where each tile is the filter for the list beneath it.
Reach for it when building
- summary strip at the top of a detail page
- dashboard KPI row
- account usage overview
- report header figures
- profile stats band
Reporting only — the figures are the whole job.
Documents1,482this period
Median time3.2slast 24h
Clean runs98.4%no retries
Quality score—not rated yet
Same strip, working as the filter. Press a tile to narrow the list; press it again to clear.
- Bicycle drivetrain teardown Done
- Kiln firing, part three Downloading
- Field recording — marsh at dawn Queued
- Lathe restoration, episode 12 Done
- Sourdough hydration tests Failed
- Bookbinding: the long stitch Queued
Showing all 6 downloads.
<p class="hss-caption">Reporting only — the figures are the whole job.</p>
<div class="hss-strip">
<div class="hss-tile"><span class="hss-label">Documents</span><span class="hss-figure">1,482</span><span class="hss-sub">this period</span></div>
<div class="hss-tile"><span class="hss-label">Median time</span><span class="hss-figure">3.2s</span><span class="hss-sub">last 24h</span></div>
<div class="hss-tile"><span class="hss-label">Clean runs</span><span class="hss-figure">98.4%</span><span class="hss-sub">no retries</span></div>
<div class="hss-tile"><span class="hss-label">Quality score</span><span class="hss-figure missing" aria-label="not rated">—</span><span class="hss-sub">not rated yet</span></div>
</div>
<div data-hss-filter>
<p class="hss-caption">Same strip, working as the filter. Press a tile to narrow the list; press it again to clear.</p>
<div class="hss-strip hss-strip--five" role="group" aria-label="Filter downloads by status">
<button class="hss-tile" type="button" data-hss="all" aria-pressed="true"><span class="hss-label">All</span><span class="hss-figure">6</span><span class="hss-sub">downloads</span></button>
<button class="hss-tile" type="button" data-hss="Queued" aria-pressed="false"><span class="hss-label">Queued</span><span class="hss-figure">2</span><span class="hss-sub">downloads</span></button>
<button class="hss-tile" type="button" data-hss="Downloading" aria-pressed="false"><span class="hss-label">Downloading</span><span class="hss-figure">1</span><span class="hss-sub">download</span></button>
<button class="hss-tile" type="button" data-hss="Done" aria-pressed="false"><span class="hss-label">Done</span><span class="hss-figure">2</span><span class="hss-sub">downloads</span></button>
<button class="hss-tile" type="button" data-hss="Failed" aria-pressed="false"><span class="hss-label">Failed</span><span class="hss-figure">1</span><span class="hss-sub">download</span></button>
</div>
<ul class="hss-list">
<li data-status="Done">Bicycle drivetrain teardown <span>Done</span></li>
<li data-status="Downloading">Kiln firing, part three <span>Downloading</span></li>
<li data-status="Queued">Field recording — marsh at dawn <span>Queued</span></li>
<li data-status="Done">Lathe restoration, episode 12 <span>Done</span></li>
<li data-status="Failed">Sourdough hydration tests <span>Failed</span></li>
<li data-status="Queued">Bookbinding: the long stitch <span>Queued</span></li>
</ul>
<p class="hss-status" data-hss-status role="status">Showing all 6 downloads.</p>
</div>Colors come from shared theme tokens — --surface, --ink, --border, --accent and friends — so this CSS carries no palette of its own. Use Runnable file to copy the tokens along with it.
.hss-strip {
display: grid;
gap: 1px;
background: var(--border);
border: 1px solid var(--border);
border-radius: var(--radius);
overflow: hidden;
grid-template-columns: 1fr;
}
@media (min-width: 21rem) { .hss-strip { grid-template-columns: repeat(2, minmax(0, 1fr)); } }
@media (min-width: 42rem) { .hss-strip { grid-template-columns: repeat(4, minmax(0, 1fr)); } }
.hss-tile { background: var(--surface); padding: 0.75rem 1rem; min-width: 0; }
.hss-label {
font-family: ui-monospace, monospace;
font-size: 0.8125rem;
text-transform: uppercase;
letter-spacing: 0.06em;
color: var(--dim);
overflow-wrap: anywhere;
}
.hss-figure { font-size: 1.6rem; font-weight: 700; font-variant-numeric: tabular-nums; }
.hss-figure.missing { color: var(--dim); }
button.hss-tile[aria-pressed="true"] {
background: color-mix(in srgb, var(--accent) 14%, var(--surface));
}Build a strip of statistic tiles that reads as one joined instrument panel rather than a row of floating cards.
The separators between tiles must not be borders. Make the container a CSS grid with gap: 1px and give the container itself the border color as its background; each tile then paints the surface color on top. The 1px of container showing through the gap is the hairline. This is the entire pattern: real borders double where two tiles meet and leave a stray edge when auto-fit wraps the row, and a gap physically cannot do either.
The full prompt continues with sections on pinning column counts, tile anatomy, two rules of honesty (render a missing value as a dimmed em dash; keep units with the number), the filter form, computing counts from the unfiltered set, and using aria-pressed rather than tab roles.
This preview is drawn in the site's sixteen greys, so the pressed tile inverts instead of tinting. The five-tile row lets labels wrap rather than clip.
Nearby in Layout
Other patterns in the same category.
Annotated transcript
Conversation bubbles with a speaker-colored spine and a fixed metadata gutter.