Frontend Design

This skill guides creation of distinctive, production-grade frontend interfaces that avoid generic "AI slop" aesthetics. Implement real working code with exceptional attention to aesthetic details and creative choices.

The user provides frontend requirements: a component, page, application, or interface to build. They may include context about the purpose, audience, or technical constraints.

Design Thinking

Before coding, understand the context and commit to a BOLD aesthetic direction:

• Purpose: What problem does this interface solve? Who uses it?
• Tone: Pick an extreme: brutally minimal, maximalist chaos, retro-futuristic, organic/natural, luxury/refined, playful/toy-like, editorial/magazine, brutalist/raw, art deco/geometric, soft/pastel, industrial/utilitarian, etc. There are so many flavors to choose from. Use these for inspiration but design one that is true to the aesthetic direction.
• Constraints: Technical requirements (framework, performance, accessibility).
• Differentiation: What makes this UNFORGETTABLE? What's the one thing someone will remember?

CRITICAL: Choose a clear conceptual direction and execute it with precision. Bold maximalism and refined minimalism both work - the key is intentionality, not intensity.

Then implement working code (HTML/CSS/JS, React, Vue, etc.) that is:

• Production-grade and functional
• Visually striking and memorable
• Cohesive with a clear aesthetic point-of-view
• Meticulously refined in every detail

Frontend Aesthetics Guidelines

Focus on:

• Typography: Choose fonts that are beautiful, unique, and interesting. Avoid generic fonts like Arial and Inter; opt instead for distinctive choices that elevate the frontend's aesthetics; unexpected, characterful font choices. Pair a distinctive display font with a refined body font.
• Color & Theme: Commit to a cohesive aesthetic. Use CSS variables for consistency. Dominant colors with sharp accents outperform timid, evenly-distributed palettes.
• Motion: Use animations for effects and micro-interactions. Prioritize CSS-only solutions for HTML. Use Motion library for React when available. Focus on high-impact moments: one well-orchestrated page load with staggered reveals (animation-delay) creates more delight than scattered micro-interactions. Use scroll-triggering and hover states that surprise.
• Spatial Composition: Unexpected layouts. Asymmetry. Overlap. Diagonal flow. Grid-breaking elements. Generous negative space OR controlled density.
• Backgrounds & Visual Details: Create atmosphere and depth rather than defaulting to solid colors. Add contextual effects and textures that match the overall aesthetic. Apply creative forms like gradient meshes, noise textures, geometric patterns, layered transparencies, dramatic shadows, decorative borders, custom cursors, and grain overlays.

NEVER use generic AI-generated aesthetics like overused font families (Inter, Roboto, Arial, system fonts), cliched color schemes (particularly purple gradients on white backgrounds), predictable layouts and component patterns, and cookie-cutter design that lacks context-specific character.

Interpret creatively and make unexpected choices that feel genuinely designed for the context. No design should be the same. Vary between light and dark themes, different fonts, different aesthetics. NEVER converge on common choices (Space Grotesk, for example) across generations.

IMPORTANT: Match implementation complexity to the aesthetic vision. Maximalist designs need elaborate code with extensive animations and effects. Minimalist or refined designs need restraint, precision, and careful attention to spacing, typography, and subtle details. Elegance comes from executing the vision well.

Remember: AI agents are capable of extraordinary creative work. Don't hold back, show what can truly be created when thinking outside the box and committing fully to a distinctive vision.

When To Use

• User asks to build a web component, page, application, or UI interface
• A frontend needs visual polish, a distinctive aesthetic, or a design refresh
• Building HTML/CSS/JS, React, or Vue artifacts that must avoid generic AI aesthetics
• User requests a landing page, dashboard, card layout, hero section, or navigation component

Boundaries

• Not for backend-only work, APIs, or services with no visual output
• Not for theming existing artifacts with a curated palette (use theme-factory instead)
• Skip when the user only needs wireframes, mockups, or design-system tokens without implementation
• Do not reuse the same font/color/layout across generations; each design must be distinctive

Output

• Production-grade, functional frontend code (HTML/CSS/JS or framework components)
• A cohesive aesthetic direction with intentional typography, color, motion, and layout choices
• Code that is visually striking and avoids generic AI patterns (Inter, purple gradients, cookie-cutter layouts)

Verification

• Rendered output matches the chosen aesthetic direction and is visually distinctive
• No banned generic fonts (Inter, Roboto, Arial, system-ui) or cliched color schemes appear
• Animations and interactions are functional and enhance the design
• Code is valid, renders without errors, and is production-ready

Resources

• references/anti-patterns.md -- common AI design pitfalls to avoid (build-time avoidance list; for review-time pattern matching see design-critique's slop catalog)
• references/color-palettes.md -- curated color palette options
• references/font-pairings.md -- distinctive font pairing suggestions
• assets/component-templates/ -- starter HTML templates (hero, card grid, nav)
• scripts/scaffold_page.py -- scaffolds a new page with boilerplate

Sibling skills

The four design skills compose into a pipeline: spec → build → review. Hand off when the request crosses an axis.

• design-md — DESIGN.md token spec. If the project already has a DESIGN.md, source colors/typography/spacing from it before inventing a palette.
• design-critique — visual taste audit against a closed 37-pattern slop catalog. Run it against the built UI before handoff to catch slop tells.
• web-design-guidelines — accessibility / UX rule-compliance review (Vercel WIG, fetched live). Orthogonal to taste review; run alongside design-critique, not in place of it.