The problem was architectural, not visual
A personal engineering site needs to publish identity, systems, notes, and case studies reliably. It does not need a database request, plugin stack, or admin runtime for every page view.
Keeping the publishing surface smaller also reduces the number of components that must be patched, monitored, and recovered.
The new constraint: static in production
Production now serves generated HTML, CSS, JavaScript, a manifest, sitemap, and security configuration. Content generation happens locally, while the public server only delivers files.
That separation makes rollback straightforward: a release is an immutable archive with a known checksum.
What improved
The architecture became easier to reason about. There is no public application database dependency, fewer runtime failure modes, tighter browser security headers, and a deterministic release pipeline.
The trade-off is deliberate: publishing new structured content requires running the local generator and release process. For this site, that is a good exchange.