Why I still write CSS by hand

Tailwind earned its place. The day I stopped naming .CardWrapperInner__title--large was the day I shipped twice as much UI. I'm not going back.

The moment it broke down

Somewhere between the third and fourth time I wrote text-sm font-medium tracking-tight leading-snug in a row, I noticed I was no longer designing. I was assembling.

Bilingual codebases

So I write CSS again — not instead of utilities, but alongside them. The design system layer.

@utility grain {
  position: relative;
  &::after {
    content: "";
    position: fixed; inset: 0;
    background-image: url("data:image/svg+xml;utf8,...");
    opacity: 0.05;
    mix-blend-mode: overlay;
  }
}

Tokens, custom properties, a handful of named utilities for the things that recur with intent: .grain, .reveal-on-scroll, .marquee. The utility soup handles the noise. The CSS layer holds the taste.

The codebase ends up bilingual. That's fine. Good design systems usually are.