DESIGN.md — Taiho Ventures (sepia-paper-editorial)

Per-style brand authority for src/styles/sepia-paper-editorial/. Produced and maintained by columbus-design-md-builder. Read by columbus-design-author at scaffold time and by columbus-design-iterator on every refinement. Treat sections 1–7 as canonical truth.

1. Aesthetic Anchor

Primary family: Editorial Minimalism (Linear / Stripe / Mintlify lineage — disciplined typography, generous whitespace, single-column read-led pages) Secondary remix: Cult / Indie touches very lightly dosed (A24 / Letterboxd lineage — quiet confidence in pull-quotes and considered metadata; never weird-for-its-own-sake), with Japanese editorial restraint as the parent-honoring layer (Muji / Kinfolk / ma — sepia-led palette, generous left-anchored margins, occasional 漢字 in section markers and footer) Reference brands: SR One (pharma heritage meets agile VC — institutional credibility) × MPM BioImpact (clinical, no-nonsense, built for PhDs) × Linear (typography rigor) × Letterboxd (quietly distinctive editorial moments). Visual baselines (use for type and clean lines only — discard their information architecture): 5AM Ventures, Third Rock Ventures. Visual atmosphere: Warm-paper, sepia-led, type-driven. The page reads like a quarterly investment letter from a serious institution — not a SaaS pitch, not an indie magazine. Generous ma, decisive single-color rules and pull-quotes in Taiho Sepia. The Cult/Indie remix shows up as confidence, not weirdness: considered captions, marginalia, dates and stages set in mono. Color is intentional and used in flat blocks. The site feels expensive but unadorned.

2. Brand Voice

Adjectives: strategic · disciplined · plain-spoken · scientifically fluent · unhurried · quietly confident Says:

"Patient capital from a $400M fund, backed by Taiho Pharmaceutical's balance sheet."
"We invest in early-stage therapeutics — preclinical through proof of concept — in oncology, immunology, and urology."
"Brought into syndicates as a strategic participant: a credible global pharma signal on the cap table."
"A bridge between breakthrough science and global commercialization."
"Three plans — research to pre-IND, IND to PoC, and opportunistic build-to-buy." Avoids: "passion" / "passionate" · "disrupt" / "disruption" · "synergy" / "synergistic" · "ecosystem play" · "transformative" · "cutting-edge" · "visionary" · "world-class team" / "world-class" · "innovative platform" · "next-generation" · "unlock value" · "journey" · "at the intersection of" · "category-defining" · "Empower your team" · "Built for the modern workflow" · "Get started" · "Sign up" · "Learn more" Sample sentences:

Taiho Ventures combines venture agility with the reach, expertise, and infrastructure of a global pharmaceutical company. We are a single team, deploying $400M from Taiho Pharmaceutical's balance sheet into early-stage therapeutics — preclinical through proof of concept, in oncology, immunology, and urology. We are typically brought into syndicates as a strategic participant. Our presence signals that a credible global pharmaceutical partner believes in the science, and may ultimately license, co-develop, or acquire the asset.

3. Color Palette & Roles

Mode: light (committed — warm paper does not translate cleanly to dark, and the audience reads at a desk) Dominant: #1A1A1C (--spe-ink) — body type, headlines, rules Accent (primary): #8A532C (--spe-sepia) — the distinctive move. Pull-quotes, section rules, secondary CTAs, marginalia. This is what separates the site from peer-CVC slop. Derived from Taiho Sepia (DIC: 345, PANTONE 168C). Accent (high-emphasis): #E31B13 (--spe-red) — primary CTA, single emphasized words, news-marker dots. Used sparingly. Derived from Taiho Red (DIC: 198, PANTONE 1795C). Accent (micro): #FABE00 (--spe-yellow) — tag pills, status markers, hover underlines. Smallest dose. Never used as a fill at meaningful scale. Derived from Taiho Yellow (DIC: 165, PANTONE 124C). Surfaces:

#F4F0E8 (--spe-paper) — page background, warm bone (not white)
#EAE3D6 (--spe-paper-deep) — pull-quote blocks, table rows on alternation
#D8CFBE (--spe-rule) — hairline borders, dividers Muted text: #6E665B (--spe-muted) — secondary copy, captions, metadata. Warm gray tied to sepia, not neutral gray. Notes: No gradients. Color is set in flat blocks, like a printed page. Sepia is the dominant visible color signature; ink is the dominant quantitative color. Red and Yellow appear at most a handful of times per page.

4. Typography Rules

Headline font: Newsreader — https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Newsreader — weights 400, 600, 800 (italic at 400 for pull-quotes). Variable, optical-size axis tuned for reading. Publication-coded restraint, not A24-tilt. Body font: IBM Plex Sans — https://fonts.google.com/specimen/IBM+Plex+Sans — weights 400, 500, 600. Humanist sans with quiet technical precision; reads as scientific without being cold. Mono / data font: IBM Plex Mono — https://fonts.google.com/specimen/IBM+Plex+Mono — weights 400, 500. Reserved for dates, stage labels, ticker-like portfolio metadata, file numbers, footnote markers. Japanese accent: Shippori Mincho — https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Shippori+Mincho — weight 500. Used at small sizes only for occasional 漢字 in section markers, footer, or pull-quote attribution. Never decoratively. Honors the parent without performing Japaneseness. Pairing principle: High-contrast — modern serif (Newsreader) for headlines and pull-quotes against humanist sans (Plex Sans) for body, with mono (Plex Mono) carrying all the structured data the audience needs to scan. Three families, three jobs, no overlap. Weight extremes: 400 body vs 800 display. Avoid the 500/600 middle for headlines; reserved 500 for body emphasis only. Size scale: H1 4.25rem, H2 2.5rem, H3 1.5rem, body 1.0625rem (17px), caption 0.875rem, mono-meta 0.8125rem Max font sizes per page: 3 Banned (do not use): Inter, Roboto, Open Sans, Lato, system stacks, Space Grotesk, Söhne (paid), Playfair Display, Montserrat, Poppins, Manrope, DM Sans, Geist (too associated with Vercel + AI tooling)

5. Layout & Density

Grid: 12-col with editorial pulls — primary content sits in 7–8 cols left-anchored; right gutter (3–4 cols) carries marginalia, dates, co-investor tags, mono-set metadata. Hero and section headers can break full-width but content reverts to anchored. Container max-width: 1200px. Wider than typical SaaS (1280px) feels generic; tighter than 1100 reads as overly precious. Section rhythm: varied — hero is dense and tight (above-the-fold mandate clarity is non-negotiable per the brief); the section after breathes wide; portfolio and team sections return to dense, scannable layouts because the audience is filtering, not browsing. Min container padding: 24px (mobile), 80px (desktop). Wide desktop margins are part of the ma / Japanese-restraint signature. Asymmetry / overlap commitments: Body copy is left-anchored, never centered. Headlines may break out left into the margin (negative-indent display moments). Pull-quotes hang into the right gutter set in Newsreader italic, sepia. Section labels are set small in Plex Mono with a kanji marker (e.g., 投資 · INVESTMENT).

6. Backgrounds & Depth

Hero treatment: Solid warm paper (#F4F0E8) — committed. The print-letter metaphor wants flat color. No gradient, no image hero, no abstract DNA-helix slop. Mandate-clarity copy carries the page above the fold; visual interest comes from typography and a single sepia rule. Atmospheric layers: Subtle paper-grain texture at 4–6% opacity over the page background (very faint, perceivable only as warmth, never as decorative noise). 1px hairline rules between sections in --spe-rule. No vignettes, no halftones, no gridlines visible. Shadow style: None. Depth comes from type weight, hairline rules, and the paper-deep surface tone — never elevation. Cards (when used) are flat with a single hairline border, never raised.

7. Do's and Don'ts

Do:

Lead with mandate clarity above the fold (per the brief: stage, modality, therapeutic areas) — type-led, no decorative imagery.
Use Taiho Sepia as the distinctive visible signature: rules, pull-quotes, section markers, secondary CTAs.
Set portfolio data, stage labels, dates, and co-investor metadata in IBM Plex Mono — make the site scannable for PhD VC associates filtering in seconds.
Use a kanji marker beside section labels (投資 · INVESTMENT, 理念 · ABOUT) at small sizes — honors the parent without performing Japaneseness.
Write copy that sounds like a serious quarterly letter: plain-spoken, scientifically fluent, no marketing tricks.
Pull quotes hang into the right gutter in Newsreader italic, sepia.

Don't:

Use Inter, Roboto, Space Grotesk, Playfair, Manrope, Geist, or any system stack.
Use gradient heroes, abstract DNA helixes, microscopy stock photos, or any "future of medicine" stock imagery.
Use the three-up icon-card feature grid (the slop default for VC and biotech sites alike).
Use hamburger nav on mobile — use a serif "Index" link or a small full-page index treatment.
Write CTAs like "Get started" / "Learn more" / "Submit a deck" — use first-person, voice-correct CTAs (e.g., "Read the mandate" / "Send us your work" / "See the portfolio").
Use yellow as a section fill or large block — it's a micro-accent only.
Use full-bleed dramatic photography. Imagery (when used) is small, captioned in mono, treated like archive material.
Write the word "passionate" or any phrase from section 2's Avoids list.
Default to centered hero copy. Body is left-anchored.

8. Agent Prompt Guide

For any agent reading this file:

Read this DESIGN.md in full before writing any code, copy, or styling for sepia-paper-editorial.
Treat sections 1–7 as canonical truth. Don't override them inline.
Reject any change that violates the Don'ts in section 7. Surface the conflict to the user rather than silently picking one side.
If the user is asking for something this DESIGN.md doesn't cover, propose an addition under section 9 (Additions log) rather than introducing the decision in component code.
If the user is asking to change something in this file (palette, anchor, voice, type), route the request back to columbus-design-md-builder rather than editing inline.
When sections conflict: section 7 (Don'ts) wins over everything; section 1 (Anchor) wins over sections 3–6; section 2 (Voice) is independent.
This brand has a real, locked parent palette (Taiho Sepia / Red / Yellow per the corporate identity guidelines). The hex values in section 3 are non-negotiable; their roles (which is dominant accent, which is high-emphasis, which is micro) are the design choice.
The audience is sharper than a typical landing page: PhD/MD associates at top-tier life-science VCs, plus serial biotech entrepreneurs. Bias every decision toward clinical clarity and scannable density over emotional storytelling.

9. Notes & References

Created: 2026-04-28 Last updated: 2026-04-28 Source URL: Real entity. Legacy site: https://www.taihoventures.com/ (treated as research/fact-finding only — not as design or copy inspiration per research/legacy-web-copy/README.md). Parent corporate identity: research/Taiho-ventures-basic-branding-v0.pdf — locks Sepia / Red / Yellow palette and the Taiho wordmark with brushstroke 千 glyph. Site brief: research/TOI2601_TVL Site Brief_v3.docx — primary source for audience definition, tone direction, mandatory features, and reference set.

Audience (from brief):

Primary: PhD/MD associates at top-tier life-science VCs (ARCH, GV, MPM Capital). Time-poor, technically fluent, scanning for clinical fit. Plus partners signing checks who want premium corporate stability.
Secondary: Serial biotech entrepreneurs and academic founders looking for patient capital, flexible deal structures, and a commercial gateway to Asia.

Mandate copy anchors (from brief, for content/):

Stage: preclinical through proof of concept
Therapeutic areas: oncology, immunology, urology
Fund size: $400M (expanded)
Models: syndicate participation, company creation, build-to-buy, spin-outs
Strategic value: Taiho Pharmaceutical R&D + clinical + commercialization infrastructure; Asia gateway

Strategic case studies to feature (from brief): Cullinan Pearl (build-to-buy), Arcus Biosciences (Asia commercialization bridge), Orna Therapeutics (platform validation), Harpoon Therapeutics (syndicate risk-sharing).

External references:

Newsreader specimen: https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Newsreader
IBM Plex Sans specimen: https://fonts.google.com/specimen/IBM+Plex+Sans
IBM Plex Mono specimen: https://fonts.google.com/specimen/IBM+Plex+Mono
Shippori Mincho specimen: https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Shippori+Mincho
Aesthetic family reference: Editorial Minimalism × Cult/Indie (lightly dosed) × Japanese editorial restraint — see .claude/skills/columbus-design-md-builder/references/aesthetic-families.md
Strategic peer references (per brief): SR One (srone.com), MPM BioImpact (mpmbioimpact.com), GV Life Sciences (gv.com).
Visual baseline references (per brief — typography and clean lines only, discard IA): 5AM Ventures (5amventures.com), Third Rock Ventures (thirdrockventures.com).
Direct competitor benchmarks (per brief): Astellas Venture (astellasventure.com), Ono Venture (onoventure.com), MRL Ventures Fund (mrlv.com).

Open questions / forward-looking constraints:

The brief states the site "should follow the upcoming Taiho Oncology U.S. brand guidelines and color system." Those guidelines are not yet available. When they ship, this DESIGN.md may need to reconcile against them — likely as an additive layer rather than a palette swap, since the parent corporate identity is the same source.
Legacy site lists the team in/around Princeton; the brief references the Menlo Park team. Both may be true (bicoastal). Treated as a copy/governance question, not a design question.

Additions log:

2026-04-28: Initial DESIGN.md captured by columbus-design-md-builder. Aesthetic anchor: Editorial Minimalism × very-lightly-dosed Cult/Indie × Japanese editorial restraint. Palette locked to parent corporate identity (Taiho Sepia / Red / Yellow). Type stack: Newsreader + IBM Plex Sans + IBM Plex Mono + Shippori Mincho.

Landing

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