I disagree that it is preferable, but that is debatable. I say that in part for the reasons you mention, but also because it seems to me that quite a lot of peo

I disagree that it is preferable, but that is debatable. I say that in part for the reasons you mention, but also because it seems to me that quite a lot of people think that "$header-color" means "substitute the value of the header-color variable here" regardless of which side it is on. I think there is probably a happy middle ground where you achieve all of the goodness (looks like CSS, follows existing core grammar, shows the property nature, uses $ in familiar ways, etc). Not sure what it is, but probably something like: :root{ def-primarycolor: blue; } .x{ background-color: $primarycolor; }