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Blossom Merz edited this page Sep 25, 2026 · 16 revisions

Home > Themes

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Preferences & Language

Themes

Recolor the app's accent - node headers, ports and wires, points, region outlines and the interface highlights - from a preset palette or one swatch at a time.

Locus draws a single accent color through the whole interface: the fill on node headers, the ports and wires in the node graph, the default point marker and region outlines in the model, the ruler cursor, and the focus rings and primary buttons in the chrome. The Themes dialog lets you change that accent - either by switching to a ready-made palette or by hand-editing individual pieces.

The default theme is Blueprint, a cyanotype blue. The palette Locus used before is preserved as Harbor.

Note

Themes are cosmetic. Changing a theme only affects colors on screen - it never changes your geometry, your file, or anything that exports. The bright gold selection highlight is deliberately not part of the theme: selected objects stay gold under every palette so selection always reads clearly.

Opening the Themes dialog

Choose Themes... from the app menu (the "Locus Studio" menu at the far left of the menu bar) - it sits directly under Settings....

Tip

In the browser build, which has no native menu bar, press ⌘⇧, (Cmd-Shift-comma; Ctrl-Shift-comma on Windows) to open Themes.

Picking a preset

At the top of the dialog is a Preset dropdown. Choosing one recolors every part of the accent at once - the change applies the moment you select it. Each strip below shows that palette's four defining colors, in order: Node header | Selected header | Ports & wires | Value-curve line.

Preset Colors
Blueprint Blueprint theme swatches
Harbor Harbor theme swatches
Graphite Graphite theme swatches
Sage Sage theme swatches
Lavender Lavender theme swatches
Terracotta Terracotta theme swatches
Sandstone Sandstone theme swatches
Merlot Merlot theme swatches
Royal Royal theme swatches
Magenta Magenta theme swatches
Synthwave Synthwave theme swatches
Toxic Toxic theme swatches
Fire&Ice Fire&Ice theme swatches
Ultraviolet Ultraviolet theme swatches
Circuit Circuit theme swatches

Editing individual colors

Below the preset dropdown, the accent is broken into named swatches grouped by the area of the app they affect. Click any swatch to open the color picker and set that piece on its own:

  • Nodes: Node header, Selected header, Ports & wires, Value-curve line
  • Modeling: Points, Region outline, Ruler cursor
  • Interface: Accent / focus, Deep accent, Buttons

Editing any single swatch switches the Preset dropdown to Custom - you've stepped off the preset and made the palette your own. To get back to a named palette, just choose it from the dropdown again; that resets all the swatches to its values.

Tip

There is no Save button, and you don't need one. Every change - a preset swap or a single swatch - applies live: the canvases repaint and the interface updates as you go. Press Esc, click Close, or click outside the panel when you're done.

What sticks, and where

Your theme is remembered per machine (it's stored in the app's local settings on this computer), so it comes back the way you left it next time you launch Locus. Because it lives with the app and not the document, a .locus file carries none of your theme - open the same file on another machine and it shows that machine's theme, and sending a file to someone else never changes their colors.

Caution

Confirm against the build. The Themes system is new (added in v0.1.238). The set of presets and swatches is expected to grow, so check the exact options against the version you're running.

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