diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..a42a21a32
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,70 @@
+# OpenDream DreamMaker Reference
+
+This project serves the DreamMaker reference, as implemented by [OpenDream](https://github.com/OpenDreamProject/OpenDream). We use [Zola](https://www.getzola.org/) to build our website.
+
+## Contributing to the Reference
+
+DreamMaker objects are kept under `content/objects`, with the `_index.html` pages under a directory providing that section's page. Procs and vars belonging to that object are kept under the respective `proc` and `var` sections.
+
+## Locally previewing the site
+
+All you need is Zola[^1]. The instructions to install Zola are [here](https://www.getzola.org/documentation/getting-started/installation/). You can then run `zola serve` to preview the site as you edit the Markdown files. You will notice that the navigation bar is incomplete - that is to optimize serve times locally - you can read more [here](https://github.com/cmss13-devs/cmss13/issues/6606).
+
+[^1]: As long as you are not altering site CSS.
+
+If you are altering site CSS, we currently use [TailwindCSS](https://tailwindcss.com/) (for now!), and you can edit class names to include Tailwind tags. Simply use `npm install` and `npm run watch`, which will run both `zola serve` (to update site contents) and `tailwind -w` (to update CSS).
+
+## Valid shortcodes
+
+We can use shortcodes to render specific HTML within our Markdown files. They're invoked like this:
+```md
+{{ some_shortcode(some_keyword_argument="some value!") }}
+```
+
+Currently, we have 4 callout shortcodes, which all take a `description` argument:
+- never_implemented
+- od_only
+- parity
+- unimplemented
+
+To read up on how to make shortcodes, the Zola documentation is [here](https://www.getzola.org/documentation/content/shortcodes/). All of our shortcodes live in [templates/shortcode](templates/shortcodes/).
+
+## Autodocumentation
+
+Most of the global procs, and objects procs and vars are automatically documented using the [OpenDreamDocumentationTool](https://github.com/harryob/OpenDream/tree/oddt/OpenDreamDocumentationTool), which runs periodically to update this reference from the [DMStandard](https://github.com/OpenDreamProject/OpenDream/tree/master/DMCompiler/DMStandard). These are all automatically updated:
+- Global procs
+- New objects
+- Object vars
+- Object procs
+
+And these frontmatter fields are automatically populated, and should not be changed manually:
+
+- Procs
+  - Name (`title`)
+  - Arguments (`args`): `name` and `type` are derived from DMStandard, but the `description` field is set manually
+  - Return type (`return_type`)
+  - Override status (`is_override`)
+  - Unimplemented status (`od_unimplemented`)
+
+- Vars
+  - Name (`title`)
+  - Default value (`default_value`)
+  - Type (`type`)
+  - Override status (`is_override`)
+  - Unimplemented status (`od_unimplemented`)
+
+## Available markdown formatting
+
+Zola uses [CommonMark](https://commonmark.org/) and the [pulldown-cmark](https://github.com/pulldown-cmark/pulldown-cmark#pulldown-cmark) parser.
+
+### Syntax highlighting
+
+We support DreamMaker syntax highlighting, with the following:
+
+`````md
+```dm
+var/my_variable
+```
+`````
+
+This is based on our [.sublime-syntax](syntaxes/dreammaker.sublime-syntax) file. This can be updated as necessary to keep up with the language.
\ No newline at end of file