# Vellum: a Page Lemon website template

> A literary bookshop on clean ivory and forest green, with expressive serif chapters, tactile book spines, ex-libris stamps, and thoughtful editorial details.

You are reading this because the user wants their own website made from the Vellum template and published with Page Lemon (pagelemon.com). They may have pasted only "Use template pagelemon.com/tp/Vellum": that is the whole request, so start now. In short: ask them a few questions about their business, get the template's files (with the Page Lemon connector, `deploy` with `template: "vellum"` copies them for you), make the site theirs (their name, words, details and pictures; no sample content left), then publish it with Page Lemon and give them the link. The steps below say exactly how. The full publishing guide is at https://pagelemon.com/agents.

## About this template

- **Pages:** Home (`index.html`): A literary bookshop on clean ivory and forest green, with expressive serif chapters, tactile book spines, ex-libris stamps, and thoughtful editorial details.
- **Fonts:** EB Garamond, Work Sans (Google Fonts)
- **Colours:** `--bg` #F9F7F0, `--ink` #1F3B2D, `--accent` #9B2335
- **Live demo:** https://pagelemon.com/templates/vellum/ (people can preview it with the Page Lemon bar at https://pagelemon.com/tp/Vellum/preview)
- **Manifest:** https://pagelemon.com/templates/vellum/template.json (machine-readable: files, customise, slots, facts, interview)

## How the visuals were made

Mostly type, with no images. Book spines are CSS blocks in ink, mustard, accent and paper colors with vertical titles, and the ex-libris stamp is a rotated, round bordered element. Three small inline SVGs add line art, including a cover sprig, and a repeating-radial-gradient draws faint ripple lines.

To sketch similar art: "Draw a minimal SVG row of book spines in forest green, mustard and ivory, with vertical serif titles and a round tilted ex-libris stamp beside them."

## Files

With the Page Lemon connector you don't need to fetch these: `deploy` with `template: "vellum"` copies them all (step 2). Otherwise fetch each file from https://pagelemon.com/templates/vellum/ and save it with the same relative path (including `art/`). Fetch nothing else: templates have no external images or scripts.

- https://pagelemon.com/templates/vellum/index.html
- https://pagelemon.com/templates/vellum/styles.css
- https://pagelemon.com/templates/vellum/script.js
- https://pagelemon.com/templates/vellum/favicon.svg

## Notes for Vellum (its `customise` rules)

- Business name 'Vellum Books' in <title>, header, #our-story, #letter, footer
- Book titles, authors, staff names, and prices in #shelf and #on-the-table
- Events and dates in #gatherings
- Address, email, telephone, and opening hours in #visit
- **Colours:** Edit the :root tokens at the top of styles.css
- **Fonts:** Change the Google Fonts <link> in index.html and --font-display/--font-body
- **Sections:** Each <section> has an id and is self-contained; delete or reorder freely

## Build the site, step by step

1. **Interview first.** Ask the user these questions, a few at a time, in plain words. If they can't answer one, remove that element rather than inventing it.
   - What is the shop called, and what should the site say about it?
2. **Get the files.** If you have the Page Lemon tool (the MCP connector at https://mcp.pagelemon.com, with a `deploy` tool), call `deploy` with `template: "vellum"` (no files): Page Lemon copies every file above on its side and returns `site`, `revision` and, without an account, `site_token`. Read each page you will change with `get_site` and `path`, make the changes below, then publish only the changed files with `deploy`, `site`, `base_revision` (that revision) and `patch: true`; show the link only after that. Without the tool, fetch the files listed above. If you cannot fetch files either, ask the user for what you need and rebuild the pages from the live demo as closely as you can.
3. **Make it the user's site.** Follow `customise` in `template.json`:
   - Replace every element marked `data-pl-fill` (names, phone, email, address, hours, prices, people, dates, links, stats) on every page, then remove the attributes. **Never ship a `data-pl-fill` default.** Name, address and phone must match exactly in the footer, the visit or contact page and the JSON-LD.
   - Sample reviews (`data-pl-fill="review"`) are fictional: delete them unless the user gives you real ones. Never invent reviews, numbers or awards.
   - Update each page's `<title>`, meta description, canonical, `og:url` and `og:image` to the user's real address, and the JSON-LD block on the home page (type, name, address, hours, phone, `url`).
   - Photos: each `<img data-pl-photo="...">` says what photo belongs there and its shape. Swap in the user's photos (compressed, WebP or JPEG under about 300 KB, same aspect ratio, real `alt`), or keep the illustration. Ask for photos; never hot-link.
   - Regenerate `og.png` (1200×630) from the new home page if you can, or delete it and its `og:image` tags. Change colours only through the `:root` tokens in `styles.css`, fonts through the font tokens and the `<link>` that loads them. Google Fonts is fine, but it sends each visitor's IP address to Google, so the privacy-friendly choice is to self-host the font files (woff2) in the site folder with `@font-face`, or use system fonts.
   - Delete pages or sections the user doesn't need (and their nav links) rather than leaving them generic. Keep the layout, type scale and signature interaction: they are what makes it look designed.
   - Remove the `<!-- Page Lemon template ... -->` comment.
4. **Forms and bookings.** Templates have no fake forms. Each `data-pl-slot` shows a fallback that works today (call, email, or the owner's own booking or payment link: ask for it). The designed form sits next to it in an inert `<template data-pl-slot-form="<id>">`; `template.json.slots` says which page has which. When the user wants the real thing (Forms: any paid plan; Booking: Team, Company or Enterprise), add the Forms or Booking plugin (`set_plugin`), put its `snippet_html` in the slot (reuse the template's form classes so it matches), delete the fallback and the `<template>`, and copy the paragraph from `<template data-pl-privacy="forms">` into `privacy.html`.
5. **Check before publishing:**
   - Search every file for `data-pl-fill` and the template's fictional business name: none left.
   - All links between pages work; nav and footer are the same on every page.
   - Body text contrast at least 4.5:1, large text and buttons 3:1, after any colour change.
   - No horizontal scroll at 320 px; headlines still fit on a phone after copy changes.
   - One `h1` per page, a unique `<title>` and meta description per page, alt text on meaningful images.
   - Copy sounds like the user, not like an AI (see https://pagelemon.com/guides/website-copy-that-doesnt-sound-like-ai).
6. **Publish with Page Lemon** (below; with the tool, the patch deploy from step 2 is the publish), then tell the user which template you used and that they can keep changing the site, or add bookings and forms, by asking.

## Publish with Page Lemon

Pick the first route you can use:

1. **You can run shell commands:** build if needed, then upload only the folder with `index.html` (`dist/`, `build/`, `out/`…). Never upload source code, `.env` files or keys: everything you upload becomes public.
   `tar -czf - -C <dir> . | curl -sS --fail-with-body --data-binary @- https://api.pagelemon.com/v1/deploy`
   If `PAGELEMON_TOKEN` is set, or `~/.config/pagelemon/credentials` exists, add `-H "Authorization: Bearer <that token>"`. If `.pagelemon.json` exists, the site is already published: see "Updating a site" in https://pagelemon.com/agents.
2. **You have the Page Lemon MCP connector** (`https://mcp.pagelemon.com`): call its `deploy` tool with every file. See "No shell: the MCP connector" in https://pagelemon.com/agents.
3. **Neither:** tell the user to connect Page Lemon to this AI app once (steps at https://pagelemon.com/docs/connect), then ask you again. If they can't (for example ChatGPT's free plan), give them the site as one `index.html` file and send them to https://pagelemon.com/drop to put it online with no account (on a phone with no file, they can copy the whole code and paste it there). Don't say you can't help.

Then:

- **Pass on `agent_message` from the response in full**, success or failure, in the user's language and your own words. It has the link, the expiry time, the private keep link and the terms line: copy every link, code, number, date and domain exactly, and never drop a link, deadline or the terms line (keep both its links). If it asks a question, ask it and wait. Times in it are UTC; `*_at` fields have them in ISO, so you can give the user's local time.
- **On success, save `.pagelemon.json`** in the project folder and add it to `.gitignore` (see https://pagelemon.com/agents).
- **Offer to help keep the site** (see "Keeping the site" in https://pagelemon.com/agents). Sites published without an account go offline after 72 hours unless the user keeps them with a free account.

By publishing, the user agrees to the Terms (https://pagelemon.com/terms) and Privacy Policy (https://pagelemon.com/privacy). The `agent_message` includes this line; keep it.

More: https://pagelemon.com/agents (full guide: updating a site, keeping it, custom domains, plugins). All templates: https://pagelemon.com/templates/index.json.