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TearsheetPaid newsletter

A paid-newsletter theme set like a trade journal, with The Cut: the members part of an issue is removed from the build.

v1.0.1since 2026

Tearsheet's home page: Harbor Notes over a heavy rule, the latest issue with its number in the margin and a meter reading 189 of 823 words free, then recent issues as ruled rows, each with a bar.Tearsheet's home page: Harbor Notes over a heavy rule, the latest issue with its number in the margin and a meter reading 189 of 823 words free, then recent issues as ruled rows, each with a bar.
The end of the free part of a members issue: a photograph of a container ship, two paragraphs, then a heavy rule, You've read 189 of 823 words, a meter, an email field and a green Read the rest button.
Issue 100, How an issue is put together: three key numbers under a rule, an opening paragraph and a captioned photograph of a container ship.
The search page in dark mode: a search for Klang with All, Free and Members filters and four matching issues, each marked free or members.

Editions

Personal and Team include every release within the major version you buy. Refunds within 14 days, no questions asked.

Tearsheet is an Astro theme for a paid newsletter, for analysts, consultants and reporters who want their archive on a site they own instead of on Substack. It takes its manners from the trade journal and the analyst briefing: heavy rules instead of cards, the issue number hung large in the margin, an archive set like a ledger, and one green for the numbers. Its signature is The Cut: a members issue ends its free part with a heavy rule, a count of the words left, a meter and the subscribe form, and everything after the marker is removed while the site is built, so it never reaches the HTML, the feed or the search index.

How it reads

  • Piazzolla for the text, with an italic dek under every headline; Barlow Semi Condensed for numbers, labels and the interface
  • The issue number hangs in the margin, with its ISO week and whether it is free or for members
  • The archive is a ledger: one ruled row per issue, grouped by year, each with a bar showing how much of it is free
  • One accent, the ledger green. Nothing is rounded and nothing has a shadow
  • Dark mode, contrast checked against WCAG AA, a layout that holds at 360px

In the free edition

  • Home, issue pages, the archive by year, topics, subscribe with a plans table, start here, sponsor, corrections, about and legal pages
  • The Cut on every members issue, and a check that searches the built site for members text after every build
  • A Buttondown subscribe form in plain HTML
  • Pictures in issues resized at build time, with plain-Markdown captions
  • An RSS feed with the free part only

What Pro adds

  • Pagefind search over the free parts, and an All/Free/Members filter on the archive
  • Subscribe forms for any provider with an HTML embed
  • A Substack importer that puts the cut where the paywall was
  • MDX components for a briefing: key numbers, a rate table with bars, corrections and caveats
  • Related issues, and a share card drawn for every issue
  • A line under The Cut that sends paying members to your provider’s web archive
  • Three colour presets and a second font pairing

Under the hood

  • Astro, Tailwind CSS v4, static output, no client-side framework
  • Lighthouse and the leak check in CI