Compass Vertical Rhythm Demo
In the past I only thought about grids from a vertical, column-based axis. When it came time to develop components or style text elements, I went rogue with vertical margin, padding, font-size and line-height. No standards– no consistency.
Susy gave me the itch
There was a paradigm shift in my front-end development methods when I came across Susy as a solution for managing fluid grid layouts. Instead of following a developers framework lead, I was able to set parameters for my grid (like column count and gutter width) and on a whim I could change those parameters without breaking my site layout. In times past, my container layout was brittle- but now with Susy, I felt in control of my grid and components.
This is a box wanting to mess with vertical rhythm... but we won't allow that
Compass extended Susy Vertically
It was only a matter of time before I needed the same methods vertically that I had found horizontally with Susy. By utilizing the Compass Vertical Rhythm variables and mixins, I am now able to utilize the same susy grid principles vertically on the box model (margin / border / padding) with text and components.
Now, if I show a body of text to a product owner and they don't like the font-size ($base-font-size) or line-height ($base-line-height), I can change the base font-size or line-height and everything stays in rhythm.