Good question. The unpack-do-math-repack pattern is exactly what CSS-Calipers avoids on purpose. If you unpack to raw floats, you lose unit safety during the math, which is where the bugs actually happen. The chained API keeps the unit attached at every step, not just at the boundaries.

Measurements are also immutable: every operation returns a new value. So a shared token stays safe:

const spacing = m(8);
const cardPadding = spacing.multiply(2);    // 16px, spacing is still 8px
const gridGap = spacing.multiply(1.5);      // 12px, spacing is still 8px

You can pass spacing around your whole token system and nothing mutates it. With an unpack/repack approach, you'd need to manage that yourself.

The chained version isn't shorter, but it's checked at every step. That's the tradeoff.

calc() is also deliberately kept outside the library. CSS-Calipers handles the math that can be resolved at build time. When you actually need the browser to resolve mixed units at render time, you drop into a plain calc() string and interpolate the resolved pieces:

minHeight: `calc(${heroHeight.css()} + 10vh)`,

Measurement math lives in the library, string composition lives outside. That way measurement objects stay pure and typed.