A wall, not a void
Five dark studies already exist, so Meridian goes the other way: a cool silver room where each piece hangs in a matted frame with a museum label.
Build guide
Meridian
A north-lit gallery where the same nocturnal work has to survive plain daylight.
How it was made
One visual idea, held from the first sketch to the last media query.
Frames as the system
Every artwork sits in the same mat, hairline, and soft shadow. The restraint is the design. Hovering a frame lifts it a few millimeters, nothing more.
The noon window
One full-viewport portrait drifts slowly against the scroll, the single moment of movement in an otherwise still room.
Honest light
The default palette is daylight with a green accent pulled from the hand study. A dusk mode ships too, and reduced motion keeps every frame exactly where it was hung.
Three release passes
Every pass ran on real desktop and phone renders, and only counted when it fixed something you could see.
Restraint over novelty
Cut a planned second moving section so the noon window stays the only motion event. One surprise per room.
Frame tuning
Rebalanced mat thickness and shadow tint across wall, hero, and note frames so the four pieces read as one hang at any width.
Mobile and access
Verified the phone hang order (artwork before headline), the native menu, focus states, contrast in both palettes, and overflow at 390 pixels.
A reusable recipe
Write the scene before the palette. Choose what visitors should physically feel, then set color, type, motion, and material around it.
The artwork stays in charge. Code and procedure can set the atmosphere, but they never stand in for the work.
Reduced motion, focus states, and a stable fallback ship first. Spectacle comes last.