In Medieval Europe, monks created “illuminated manuscripts”: books and documents embellished with miniature illustrations, flourishes, and bespoke styling. They were writing each one by hand anyway, so why not add some light artistry?

But by 1440, Johannes Gutenberg had arrived with the printing press, document creation became more structured and text-driven, and illuminated manuscripts began to fade away.

Nearly six hundred years later, bloggers stare into HTML <textarea> inputs, as rigid as any of Gutenberg’s text block frames.

But, as I’ve discovered over the last six months, one of the most enjoyable aspects of running your own blog is that you can write whatever one-off custom code, elements, and illustrations you want for each post.

You can create an “illuminated blog,” with code-as-art in any post, mirroring the monastic scriptoria of the 13th century — except instead of using silver rods on vellum, we use Cursor on CSS.

Here are a few “illuminations” I’ve enjoyed putting together for recent posts.

In All light is not created equal

When discussing the appearance of fluorescent bulbs, I made the phrase “vibrate slightly”… vibrate slightly:

When you’re in that environment, faces look tired and flat and discolored. Objects in your peripheral vision vibrate slightly. Everything looks a little off.

In Ways of Looking

I added an interactive, styled perspective list to avoid a wall of text in the post:

I know the Buddhist angle isn’t everyone’s thing. But they’re not the only ones who have glimpsed this idea:

Different Traditions, Same Insight

Quantum physicist John Wheeler argues that we live in a ‘participatory universe’ and that the observer is not separate from what is observed — our measurement (or way of looking) defines what seems to happen.

In The death of Nor Eply

I created an email window rather than taking a screenshot or just putting it in text (complete with hover effects on the buttons):

Misuse of your Stanford account

In It’s illegal to buy healthy lightbulbs in California

I made responsive, interactive, CSS-only spectrogram charts that fit into the blog’s styling:

2700K looks like a nice evening light, right? Well, here’s a spectrogram for a 2700K LED bulb I found lying around:

Wavelength (nm) Relative Intensity 380 480 580 680 780 25% 50% 75% 100%
0.7% intensity
at 380 nm
1.0% intensity
at 385 nm
0.8% intensity
at 390 nm
1.1% intensity
at 395 nm
0.9% intensity
at 400 nm
1.0% intensity
at 405 nm
1.6% intensity
at 410 nm
1.9% intensity
at 415 nm
3.2% intensity
at 420 nm
4.7% intensity
at 425 nm
8.0% intensity
at 430 nm
14.2% intensity
at 435 nm
25.4% intensity
at 440 nm
42.5% intensity
at 445 nm
52.5% intensity
at 450 nm
47.9% intensity
at 455 nm
37.7% intensity
at 460 nm
31.7% intensity
at 465 nm
26.2% intensity
at 470 nm
22.6% intensity
at 475 nm
22.6% intensity
at 480 nm
24.8% intensity
at 485 nm
28.9% intensity
at 490 nm
33.6% intensity
at 495 nm
39.0% intensity
at 500 nm
43.6% intensity
at 505 nm
47.8% intensity
at 510 nm
51.5% intensity
at 515 nm
53.9% intensity
at 520 nm
57.0% intensity
at 525 nm
59.2% intensity
at 530 nm
61.7% intensity
at 535 nm
63.4% intensity
at 540 nm
65.6% intensity
at 545 nm
67.9% intensity
at 550 nm
70.1% intensity
at 555 nm
72.4% intensity
at 560 nm
74.4% intensity
at 565 nm
77.1% intensity
at 570 nm
79.3% intensity
at 575 nm
82.3% intensity
at 580 nm
84.5% intensity
at 585 nm
87.5% intensity
at 590 nm
90.3% intensity
at 595 nm
93.0% intensity
at 600 nm
95.5% intensity
at 605 nm
97.2% intensity
at 610 nm
99.3% intensity
at 615 nm
100.0% intensity
at 620 nm
99.9% intensity
at 625 nm
98.8% intensity
at 630 nm
96.7% intensity
at 635 nm
94.6% intensity
at 640 nm
91.3% intensity
at 645 nm
87.1% intensity
at 650 nm
82.0% intensity
at 655 nm
76.5% intensity
at 660 nm
71.3% intensity
at 665 nm
65.3% intensity
at 670 nm
59.7% intensity
at 675 nm
54.3% intensity
at 680 nm
48.4% intensity
at 685 nm
43.1% intensity
at 690 nm
38.3% intensity
at 695 nm
33.6% intensity
at 700 nm
29.2% intensity
at 705 nm
25.6% intensity
at 710 nm
22.3% intensity
at 715 nm
19.8% intensity
at 720 nm
17.6% intensity
at 725 nm
15.2% intensity
at 730 nm
12.9% intensity
at 735 nm
11.0% intensity
at 740 nm
9.6% intensity
at 745 nm
8.1% intensity
at 750 nm
7.5% intensity
at 755 nm
6.3% intensity
at 760 nm
5.8% intensity
at 765 nm
5.1% intensity
at 770 nm
4.7% intensity
at 775 nm
4.1% intensity
at 780 nm

In Startup PR, Part I

I added a simple iMessage-like chat window to illustrate an interaction:

They might agree to the embargo to hear the pitch. Or, they might reply:

Chat

We’ve got some really exciting news at Acme Corp. I’d love to share with you. Could you agree to an embargo for next Thursday at 9am ET?

Is this an exclusive?

And more

There are more buried around the blog, and I expect to keep going. Writing posts is fun, but even better is adding a dash of illumination. Maybe the monks had it right after all.

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