Quarto template for ANU Letter

This repository contains a Quarto template for writing letters on Australian National University (ANU) letterhead. You write the letter in Markdown, set the sender, recipient and other details in the YAML header, and Quarto renders it to a PDF with the ANU crest, gold side rule and a clean, modern layout. The letter can be rendered with either LaTeX or Typst, and both give the same layout.

The image above is the LaTeX version. The Typst version looks the same.

Features

• ANU crest and gold rule on the first page, with a lighter background on following pages
• Sender address block aligned to the right of the crest
• Optional subject line, sender position, signature image, enclosures, cc list and postscript
• Support for multiple signatories
• A4 paper, Roboto sans-serif font and ANU gold accents
• Page numbers (“Page 2 of 3”) from the second page onwards
• Two formats with the same layout: quarto-anu-letter-pdf (LaTeX) and quarto-anu-letter-typst (Typst)

Requirements

• Quarto 1.4 or later. The Typst format needs a version of Quarto that comes with Typst 0.12 or later (it has been tested with Quarto 1.9, which includes Typst 0.13). You can check with quarto typst --version.

• For the LaTeX format only, a LaTeX distribution. If you don’t have one, the easiest option is TinyTeX:

  quarto install tinytex

  TinyTeX installs any missing LaTeX packages (such as the Roboto font) automatically the first time you render.

The Typst format needs nothing else: Typst comes with Quarto, and the Roboto font is included in the extension.

Installing

To start a new letter from the template, run:

quarto use template anuopensci/quarto-anu-letter

This creates a new directory containing template.qmd and the _extensions/ folder. Rename template.qmd to whatever you like and edit it.

To add the format to an existing project instead, run:

quarto add anuopensci/quarto-anu-letter

and set format: quarto-anu-letter-pdf (or quarto-anu-letter-typst) in the YAML header of your document.

Usage

Write the body of the letter in Markdown below the YAML header, then render it:

quarto render template.qmd

A minimal letter looks like this:

---
format: quarto-anu-letter-pdf
author:
  - name: Alison Doe
    position: Director
    affiliation:
      - name: Australian National University
        department: Research School of Finance, Actuarial Studies and Statistics
        address: "26C Kingsley Street"
        city: Canberra ACT
        country: Australia
        postal-code: 2601
address:
  - Director Doe & Co
  - 35 Anthony Road
  - Newport
  - Ipswich IP3 5RT
subject: collaboration
opening: "Dear Sir or Madam,"
closing: "Yours faithfully,"
---

The body of the letter goes here.

LaTeX or Typst

The template renders with LaTeX by default. To use Typst instead, change the format in the YAML header:

format: quarto-anu-letter-typst

or keep the header as it is and choose the format when you render:

quarto render template.qmd --to quarto-anu-letter-typst

Both formats take the same options and produce the same layout. Typst renders faster and doesn’t need a LaTeX installation, while the LaTeX format lets you add your own LaTeX packages and commands.

Options

The options below work the same way in both formats.

Sender

The sender is set with author. The name and position appear in the signature, and the first affiliation appears in the address block at the top of the letter.

Field	Description
name	Sender’s name, shown in bold in the signature.
position	Optional. Job title, shown in grey below the name.
signature	Optional. Path to an image of the signature (e.g. a PNG with a transparent background), shown above the name.
affiliation: name	Organisation name, shown in bold at the top of the letter.
affiliation: department	Optional. School, college or department.
affiliation: address	Optional. Street address.
affiliation: city	City and state, e.g. Canberra ACT.
affiliation: postal-code	Postcode, printed after the city.
affiliation: country	Optional. Country.

The signature.png included with the template is a made-up example. Replace it with a scan of your own signature, cropped closely and ideally with a transparent background. It is scaled to 1.3cm high.

To have more than one person sign the letter, list several authors. Each author gets their own signature block, and each author’s first affiliation is listed in the address block at the top.

Letter

Field	Description
address	Recipient’s name and address, one line per list item.
date	Date of the letter. Defaults to today.
date-format	Format of the date. Defaults to "DD MMMM YYYY" (e.g. 28 October 2026).
subject	Optional. Subject of the letter. Omit it to leave out the subject line entirely.
subject-title	Optional. Label before the subject. Defaults to Subject.
subject-suffix	Optional. Text between the label and the subject. Defaults to :.
opening	Salutation, e.g. "Dear Dr Smith,".
closing	Sign-off, e.g. "Yours sincerely,".
encl	Optional. List of enclosures.
cc	Optional. List of people receiving a copy.
ps	Optional. Postscript, shown at the end of the letter.
title	Title stored in the PDF metadata. It is not printed on the letter.

For example, to use “Re” instead of “Subject:”:

subject: Your application
subject-title: Re
subject-suffix: ":"

Customising

All the styling lives in _extensions/quarto-anu-letter/:

• _extension.yml defines both formats. For LaTeX it sets the paper size, margins, font, colours and the layout of the top of the letter (the \opening command). For Typst it sets the paper size, margins and font.
• The LaTeX format is built on the LaTeX letter class:
  • partials/before-body.tex sets up the signature, sender address and subject.
  • partials/after-body.tex adds the closing, enclosures, cc list and postscript.
  • partials/_authors.tex formats the sender’s address block.
• The Typst format is defined in two files:
  • partials/typst-template.typ lays out the letter and sets the colours.
  • partials/typst-show.typ passes the options from the YAML header to the template.
• fonts/ holds the Roboto font files used by the Typst format.
• assets/images/ holds the background images for the first page (coverpage.jpg) and the following pages (page-background.jpg).

You can also override most format options from your document’s YAML header without editing the extension. For example, to change the margins in the LaTeX format:

format:
  quarto-anu-letter-pdf:
    geometry:
      - "margin=2.5cm"

and in the Typst format:

format:
  quarto-anu-letter-typst:
    margin:
      x: 2.5cm
      y: 2.5cm

The Typst format also accepts Quarto’s papersize, mainfont and fontsize options.

Acknowledgements

This template is heavily inspired by quarto-letter by Mickaël Canouil.

The Typst format includes the Roboto font by Google, which is licensed under the Apache License 2.0 (see _extensions/quarto-anu-letter/fonts/LICENSE).