Reference and Concepts
Theme priority chain
The five-level theme inheritance chain, with worked examples and a debugging recipe for wrong colours.
Themes in Gleo cascade. When a public-facing surface needs to render colours, fonts, and a logo, Gleo walks a five-level chain from most specific to least specific and uses the first explicit theme it finds.
The chain
runtime override] ST[2. Session Template theme
template override] PT[3. Playbook Template theme
parent template] PB[4. Playbook theme
parent runtime instance] CD[5. Company default theme
fallback] S --> ST ST --> PT PT --> PB PB --> CD
Highest priority is at the top. Absence falls through to the next level.
Each level explained
| # | Level | Where it's set | When you'd use it |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Session theme | On a live Session in the planner | A one-off override — e.g. a co-branded session for a client. |
| 2 | Session Template theme | On a Session Template in Studio | A specific session type that should always render in a particular brand (e.g. a partner-branded workshop). |
| 3 | Playbook Template theme | On a Playbook Template in Studio | A reusable playbook that ships with its own theme (e.g. a Marketplace template branded to its publisher). |
| 4 | Playbook theme | On a running Playbook | An engagement-specific theme — a customer-branded instance of a generic template. |
| 5 | Company default theme | In Brand Centre | The fallback for everything else. Set this once, well, and most surfaces will never need to override it. |
A worked example
Imagine a Beach Consulting workspace running a "Strategic Planning" playbook for a client called Northwind. The themes set are:
- Company default: Beach Consulting's blue + serif theme.
- Playbook (runtime): Northwind's purple + sans-serif theme (set on the running engagement).
- Session "Kick-off": no override.
- Session "Final readout": a one-off override — Northwind's purple but with a custom logo lockup for the final presentation.
What renders where:
| Surface | Resolved theme | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Northwind playbook home | Northwind purple | Playbook theme (level 4) wins over company default (level 5). |
| "Kick-off" session prep page | Northwind purple | Same — falls through to Playbook theme. |
| "Final readout" session prep page | Northwind purple + custom lockup | Session theme (level 1) overrides everything below. |
| A separate, unrelated Beach Consulting playbook | Beach Consulting blue | No Playbook override → falls all the way to Company default. |
The debugging recipe
If a public surface is rendering the "wrong" colours, walk the chain top-down:
-
1
Check the Session
Is there an explicit theme set on this specific session? Open the session in the planner; theme overrides are visible at the top of the design pane.
-
2
Check the Session Template
If the session was instantiated from a template, open that Session Template in Studio and check whether it has a baked-in theme. Common gotcha for Marketplace-sourced templates.
-
3
Check the Playbook Template
Same exercise one level up. A Playbook Template can carry its own theme that all its Session Templates inherit unless they override.
-
4
Check the Playbook
For runtime overrides, open the Playbook's settings. A Playbook-level theme will apply to every session beneath it that doesn't override.
-
5
Check Brand Centre
If nothing above has an explicit theme, you're seeing the company default. Update it in Brand Centre, or add a more specific override at the right level.
Most "wrong colours" issues are explained by an override two levels up. Don't assume the most-specific level is the source — the chain often surprises you. Walking top → bottom from the runtime is faster than guessing.