# Brand Style > Applies the Northlight brand identity — approved fonts, the brand palette, and full-color logo artwork — to every deliverable file. Use this skill automatically and without being asked whenever producing a Word document, PowerPoint deck, Excel workbook, PDF, HTML page, dashboard, chart, or image for Northlight. Reports, memos, letters, board decks, one-pagers, proposals, policies, briefs, trackers, and scorecards all qualify. Trigger even when the user says nothing about branding, style, fonts, colors, or logos — branding is the default, not a request. Also use when asked to look up a brand color or hex value, restyle or clean up an existing file, check whether something is on brand, or fix a document that looks generic or off-brand. Do not apply to Markdown, Python, JSON, YAML, CSV, or source code files. - Skill: `jbisaccia-9/brand-style` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 10 files) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add jbisaccia-9/brand-style` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/jbisaccia-9/brand-style/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Design & Media - Author: jbisaccia-9 (https://skillmd.com/u/jbisaccia-9) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/jbisaccia-9/brand-style --- # Northlight Brand Style Every file that leaves this workspace and could be seen by a colleague, client, or board member should look like Northlight made it. That is the whole job of this skill: turn "a document" into "a Northlight document" without the user having to ask. Source of truth: `assets/tokens.json`. The palette, fonts, and logo files are loaded from it — never paste hex codes into a builder. ## Apply by default Brand these without being asked: `.docx` `.pptx` `.xlsx` `.pdf` `.html` and any chart or image that will be embedded in them. Leave these alone: `.md` `.py` `.json` `.yaml` `.csv` `.txt`, source code, and config files. They're plumbing, not deliverables. If a Markdown file is a draft that will *become* a Word doc or deck, brand the final artifact, not the draft. The only reason to skip branding on a supported format is the user explicitly saying so ("plain," "no branding," "unstyled"). Don't ask permission first; produce the branded version and mention it in one line at the end. ## The rules that matter most These are the ones that get violated, in the order they get violated. Each has a number because `scripts/brand_check.py` enforces it by that number. 1. **R1 — Body text is Ink `#2B2B2B`, never pure black.** The guide names one text color and that's it. 2. **R3/R4 — The logo appears in full color, on a light surface.** `BRAND.logo("primary")` is the default everywhere, and color artwork needs a light background — so **design the surface around the logo, not the other way round**. Title slides, closing slides, letterheads, and page headers are white or Paper `#F7F7F5`; brand presence comes from Blue headings plus a green/amber accent band. Don't reach for `logo("reversed")` to make a dark layout work — change the background. Reversed is the exception, for a dark photograph or a supplied template you can't alter. 3. **R4 — Never put the color logo on a saturated fill.** Blue or Green behind the primary artwork closes up the mark's white channels and kills the wordmark. If a surface must be saturated (section dividers), leave the logo off entirely rather than knocking it out. 4. **Never modify the logo** — no stretching, recoloring, dropping the wordmark, adding shadows. Use the bundled files as-is and set *one* dimension so the aspect ratio is preserved. Minimum 1 inch wide. 5. **Stone `#7A7A78` is for physical swag.** In documents it's acceptable for captions and footers only — never as a chart or accent color when a primary color would do. 6. **R6 — The tint palette is for fills, never for type.** `#DCE8F5` text on white is unreadable. 7. **R5 — Charts follow the series order** in `BRAND.CHART_SERIES` (blue → green → amber → lilac → rose → clay). Don't let Office pick. ## Locate the toolkit first The tokens, logo artwork, and builder scripts ship alongside this file. Normally they sit right next to it in the installed skill directory; they may instead live in a working folder. Locate them before doing anything else: ```python import glob, os, sys ROOTS = [os.path.expanduser("~/.claude/skills"), os.getcwd(), "/tmp", *glob.glob("/sessions/*/mnt")] # Depth-bounded globs rather than a recursive walk: skill caches nest deep and # rglob over them is slow enough to feel broken. Fixed-depth globs never # enumerate the whole tree. found = [p for root in ROOTS for d in range(7) for p in glob.glob(os.path.join(root, *(["*"] * d), "brand-style", "scripts", "brand.py"))] # The marker file is the test, not the directory name: some locations hold a # copy of this SKILL.md with no assets beside it. roots = sorted({os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(p)) for p in found}) SKILL = roots[0] sys.path.insert(0, SKILL + "/scripts") ``` A valid library has `scripts/` (the builders + checker) and `assets/` (`tokens.json`, `logo-primary.png`, `logo-reversed.png`). If `roots` comes up empty, the toolkit isn't on this machine — say so plainly rather than improvising. You can still apply the palette by hex for HTML, but you cannot produce a properly branded Office file without the logo artwork. Quietly shipping default fonts and no logo is worse than telling the user the library is missing. Treat the library as read-only; everything here writes only to the output path you're given. ## How to build each format All scripts live in `scripts/`. Every builder ends with `finish()`, which saves and then **reopens** the file — a malformed part fails at write time on your machine, not on the recipient's. Don't hand-roll a `save()`. ### Word ```python from brand_docx import new_document, finish, style_table, add_callout doc = new_document("Quarterly Review", "Prepared for the board", "Q3") doc.add_heading("Findings", 1) # already Blue, heading family doc.add_paragraph("Body copy.") # already Ink at 11pt add_callout(doc, "Key takeaway in a tinted box.") t = doc.add_table(rows=2, cols=3); ...; style_table(t) finish(doc, "out.docx") ``` `new_document()` rewrites the built-in styles, so plain python-docx calls come out branded. `header="letterhead"` (default) is a compact logo-rule-title block with no page break — right for memos and one-pagers. `header="titlepage"` adds the break for reports long enough to justify a cover. ### PowerPoint ```python from brand_pptx import (new_deck, title_slide, section_slide, bullets_slide, kpi_slide, chart_slide, closing_slide, content_slide, finish) d = new_deck() # 16:9 title_slide(d, "Quarterly Review", "Board of Directors", "Q3") section_slide(d, "Where we stand", "Context") bullets_slide(d, "Three things moved", ["Rate up 3 pts", ("detail", 1)]) kpi_slide(d, "The numbers", [("91%", "Rate"), ("13,910", "Sessions")]) chart_slide(d, "Sessions by quarter", ["Q1","Q2"], {"2026": [1200, 1310]}) closing_slide(d) finish(d, "deck.pptx") ``` `chart_slide()` makes a *native* PowerPoint chart that stays editable — prefer it over pasting a matplotlib image. For anything custom, `content_slide()` returns `(slide, content_top)` with the branded header already drawn. Title and closing slides are light with the color logo and a green band; section dividers are full-bleed Green with no logo. That alternation gives a deck rhythm — keep logo-bearing surfaces light and let saturated fills carry type only. ### Excel ```python from brand_xlsx import add_title_block, style_sheet, finish hr = add_title_block(ws, "Quarterly Rates", "Q3") # returns the header row style_sheet(ws, header_row=hr, number_format="#,##0") finish(wb, "rates.xlsx") ``` Call `add_title_block` *before* `style_sheet` and pass the row it returns. Excel can't embed fonts; if exact typography matters, deliver a PDF too. ### HTML, dashboards, and PDF ```python from brand_web import page, kpi, table, finish html = page("Quarterly Dashboard", body_html, subtitle="Board review") ``` `page()` returns one self-contained file with the logo base64-embedded — no external requests, so it survives being emailed around. Use the `.b-*` classes (`b-card`, `b-kpi`, `table.b`) rather than inventing styling. For PDFs, build the HTML and print it (the stylesheet has a print block), or convert a `.docx`/`.pptx`. ## Fonts | Use | Family name | |---|---| | Body copy | `Inter` | | Bold/emphasis | `Inter` with bold on — *same* family | | Headings | `Inter Medium` — a **separate** family name | That last row is the gotcha that survives every brand: asking for the body family + bold gives you Bold, not Medium. Headings must name the heading family explicitly. Licensing matters more than it looks. Inter is OFL — safe to bundle and embed. Many corporate fonts are *preview-and-print* licensed: embedding is permitted and files render correctly for recipients, but some Word builds open such files read-only. If a recipient reports a read-only file, that's the cause — disable embedding for editable drafts or send a PDF. ## Palette ``` Primary Blue #1F5AA6 Green #2E9E6B Amber #F2B84B Background Paper #F7F7F5 Blue tint #DCE8F5 Green tint #D7EDE3 Amber tint #FBEFD2 Text Ink #2B2B2B Secondary Clay #E8C9B0 Rose #E9B3B3 Lilac #CFC3E0 Swag only Stone #7A7A78 ``` Import from `brand` (`BRAND.BLUE`, `BRAND.hex("BLUE")`, `BRAND.rgb("BLUE")`) rather than pasting hex, so a palette correction propagates. Blue leads, green and amber support, secondary pastels accent. A document that is mostly blue-and-white with amber emphasis reads correctly; one that gives equal weight to all seven colors doesn't. ## Voice, when writing the words too Plain, warm, concrete. Write for the reader who has thirty seconds. Product names carry their mark on first use. The tagline is set in lowercase. ## Before delivering Cheap to fix, expensive to send: - Any pure black `#000000` text? Should be Ink. - Is the logo the full color version, on a light background? A white knockout logo means a surface got built dark that shouldn't have. - Color logo sitting on Blue or Green? Lighten the background or drop the logo. - Logo distorted, or under 1 inch wide? - Headings using the body family where the heading family was intended? - Chart colors off the series order, or an Office default palette? - Does the file actually open? `finish()` reopens it for you. All of that is machine-checkable, and **it is the gate**: ```bash python scripts/brand_check.py ``` It prints PASS/FAIL per file with the rule number that failed, writes `grading.json` beside the outputs, and exits non-zero if anything is off-brand. Run it on anything headed outside the organization.