[Feature Request]: Blockquote support in TextContent

[TrevorBurnham]

Description

The TextContent component doesn't apply any styles to the <blockquote> element, which means that block quotes are styled according to the user agent stylesheet (or the CSS reset if one is used). The Typography guidelines don't mention block quotes, either.

Block quotes are a common feature of writing on the web, and I find myself using them in documentation components such as help panels. It'd be nice for them to be standardized to fit in with the rest of Cloudscape's typography.

Code of Conduct

• I agree to follow this project's Code of Conduct
• I checked the current issues for duplicate requests

[at-susie]

Hi @TrevorBurnham,

Thank you for the feature request!

At the moment, the TextContent component does not apply any custom styling to the <blockquote> element beyond basic typography (such as font family, font size, and line height). Otherwise, it relies on the browser’s default HTML styles. To introduce additional default styling at the component level, we would need more evidence that this change would be broadly beneficial across different use cases.

If you’d like to customize the appearance of blockquotes in your implementation, you can apply your own CSS styles to achieve a look that aligns with your application’s design.

Best regards,
Atsushi

[bishopZ]

I completely understand the need for evidence of broader applicability.
I did some research across AWS marketing pages to see how quotations are currently being used in practice:

• https://aws.amazon.com/professional-services/customers/
• https://aws.amazon.com/training/traincert-customer-testimonials/
• https://aws.amazon.com/premiumsupport/customers/testimonials/
• https://aws.amazon.com/dms/customers/

While there's some variation, I noticed a few common patterns:

• Quotation marks are typically included around the quote text (not italicized)
• Optional indentation for visual distinction
• Attribution follows the format "Name, Position, Company" in bold
• No "-" character preceding the attribution

I also wanted to share some thoughts on the semantic HTML considerations. According to the HTML specification, blockquotes with attribution are best wrapped in a <figure> element, with the citation in a <figcaption> element. This provides better accessibility and clearer semantic meaning. (The <cite> element is actually meant for creative works like books, not people or companies.) [blockquote, figure, cite]

While custom CSS can achieve some visual consistency, I found it has practical limitations: it requires each developer to understand the semantic HTML details (which wasn't consistently applied in the examples I reviewed), and CSS alone can't enforce proper markup structure. Here's an example of what CSS alone can achieve:

figure { width: 100%; }
blockquote::before { content: """; }
blockquote::after { content: """; }
blockquote { margin: 0; }
blockquote.indent { margin-left: 1rem; }
blockquote + figcaption { font-weight: bold; }

For my use case, I went ahead and created a Blockquote component as a Cloudscape Addon, which handles both the styling and semantic structure: https://cloudscape.bishopz.com/docs/blockquote

I'm sharing this in case it's helpful to others facing similar needs, or if it provides useful reference material should the team decide to revisit this in the future. Thanks again!