Add a new editorial section

Editorial sections are defined in a single data file. Adding one is a three-step process that takes less than five minutes and requires no template changes.

Project Broadsheet ships with nine editorial sections by default: News, Opinion, Analysis, Arts & Culture, Science & Tech, History, Letters, Reviews, and Editions. You can add, remove, or rename sections without editing any templates, the entire site regenerates from a single data file.

Step 1. Define the section

Open src/_data/site.json and append a new object to the sections array:

{
  "slug": "science",
  "label": "Science",
  "color": "#2C5F8A",
  "description": "Rigorous, accessible science writing."
}

The slug is the URL segment (e.g. /science/). The label is the human-readable name that appears in navigation. The color is the accent used for section headlines and breadcrumbs. The description feeds into the section's meta description and RSS feed subtitle.

Step 2. Create the content folder

mkdir src/content/science

Project Broadsheet reads articles from src/content/{slug}/. Without the matching folder, the section index page has nothing to show.

Step 3. Write an article

Create src/content/science/first-article.md with standard front matter:

---
title: My first science article
section: science
date: 2026-04-17
---

Everything below the closing --- is the article body, written in Markdown.

What Project Broadsheet generates automatically

• An index page at /science/ with pagination across articles.
• An RSS feed at /science/feed.xml.
• The section's accent color applied to headlines, breadcrumbs, and section badges.
• Inclusion in on-site search, the XML sitemap, and the homepage (where applicable).

What to do next

• Add author pages so contributor bylines resolve to bio pages.
• Customize the section layout if you want a section to look different from the others.