Workshop notes — reducing the black from D

• E — takes D's approach but flips who's black: only the current/featured event card goes charcoal, the other three stay fully cream/paper like the rest of the issue. Black now reads as "this one matters most" rather than being the strip's default tone.
• F — the boldest reduction: black is contained to a 44px rounded date-stamp in the corner of each card, the card body itself is always cream/paper with a faint dot texture. Reads closest to a postage-stamp/ticket motif. Zero risk of feeling like a dark UI widget.
• G — keeps D's "the current event is dramatically different" idea, but swaps pure black (#1a1a1a) for a warm deep brown (#2a1f14, close to burnt umber) so even the darkest card never reads as flat black — it stays inside the terracotta/gold family.
• My read: F solves "too much black" most completely (it's now a tiny accent, not a card-covering colour) while keeping real drama and object-ness. E is the closer cousin of D if you still want one card to go fully dark, just not all of them.