Brad Frost avatar Brad Frost

Layout & Grid in Design Systems

Screenshot of “Layout & Grid in Design Systems”

This interdisciplinary disconnect around grid’s mental model affects how teams execute grid. In a broken, unidirectional, “developer handoff” process, design comps are treated as sacrosanct, and developers see that 12-column semi-transparent pink guideline as a hard requirement that must implemented exactly as articulated by the static design tool. This is how a “how to do a 12-column grid in HTML/CSS?” Google search ultimately led to massive success for tools like Bootstrap. Despite the introduction of many new CSS technologies and layout techniques over many years, this antiquated 12-column mental model still dominates a lot of conversations around layout and grid.