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February 2, 2026/Engineering

Building in Public: Why I Rewrote My Personal Site

The story behind rebuilding aravindh.me with Next.js 15, Tailwind, and a dark gold aesthetic.

buildingnext.jsdesign

The Why

I've had a personal site for years, but it was stale. The same tired template that thousands of developers use. It didn't represent who I am today.

So I built something new.

The Stack

  • Next.js 15 with App Router
  • Tailwind CSS for styling
  • MDX for blog content
  • TypeScript throughout

The choice was deliberate. Next.js 15 gives us React 19 features. App Router makes everything cleaner. And Tailwind? It's fast, consistent, and once you learn the utility patterns, you can't go back.

The Design

I wanted something that felt industrial but warm. Black background (#000000) with gold accents (#D4AF37). The subtle glow effect in the center? That's inspired by Helios Innovations — a site I admired for its minimalism.

The corner accents on the cards, the monospace details, the tracking on the uppercase text. Every element has intent.

What I Learned

  • MDX is easier than you think — with @next/mdx, it just works
  • Static generation is fast — blog posts compile at build time
  • Design systems matter — even for a personal site, having a color system defined in tailwind.config.js saves time

    • The Future

    This site will evolve. More posts. Maybe a newsletter signup. Projects section. But the foundation is solid now.

    If you're reading this and thinking about rebuilding your own site: just do it. Start simple. Add complexity as you need it.

    "Engineering the future at the intersection of performance and high-impact industrial design."