[ActionHank]

It makes sense, but I struggle to see the value outside of whitelabel products that you may look to rebrand, but with the same UI.

Generally UI is built around a singular look and feel at a given point in time. Trends change, people change, ideas and features change.

You eventually end up with a rebranding and along with that some sort of UI refactoring.

This approach is incredibly valuable when building something that won't change drastically when you are changing those tokens.

[whoisstan]

It has to be useful for large organizations like for example IBM who need to maintain consistency on various domains, displays and media types. But I suspect it also can stiffle innovation.

[kaelig]

It also helps small teams build faster. A shared language around color, spacing, typography makes design/engineering collaboration way smoother, and reduces rework.

A good first step is to have your color palette in your design tool of choice consistent with the variable names used in CSS.

> But I suspect it also can stiffle innovation.

Like any system: it can both be empowering or the opposite.

It's a tough balancing act. Let's say you're Adobe, and you want Photoshop/Illustrator/InDesign to feel like a single family of products across web/iOS/iPadOS/Windows: where do you want to let feature teams innovate, and where must they adhere to the system so users can navigate seamlessly across these products and platforms?

[whoisstan]

Its like parenting, be loose and strict in the same way. You have to find a good balance given the team composition and corporate restrictions.