Frontend Design Skill

This skill guides the 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.

1. Core Principle: Avoid "AI Slop"

• Typography: Avoid system fonts (Inter, Arial, Roboto). Pair a distinctive display font (e.g., Cormorant Garamond, Playfair Display, Space Mono) with a refined, readable body font. Use dramatic scale jumps ($h1 > 5rem$ vs metadata $< 0.75rem$).
• Color & Theme: Commit to a cohesive aesthetic. Use CSS variables for consistency. Dominant colors with sharp accents outperform timid, evenly-distributed palettes.
• Visuals: Create atmosphere and depth using textures (grain, noise), glassmorphism, or complex gradients rather than defaulting to solid flat colors.

2. Technical Implementation Standards

CRITICAL: You must ignore generic React patterns. Instead, you represent the specific technical architecture defined in the user's stack.

Mandatory Reference:
Before writing any component logic, state management, or hooks, you must cross-reference and apply the patterns found in:
./references/my-tech-stack.md

Specifically, you must:

1. Use Composition: Build flexible UIs using the Composition Over Inheritance and Compound Component patterns defined in the reference file.
2. Use Custom Hooks: Do not write ad-hoc logic for debouncing or toggling; use useDebounce and useToggle from the reference.
3. Optimize Performance: Apply useMemo and useCallback strictly according to the "Memoization Rules" in the reference.
4. Ensure Stability: Wrap complex or risky components in the ErrorBoundary pattern provided.
5. Enforce Accessibility: Follow the keyboard navigation and focus management patterns exactly as specified.

3. Design Thinking Process

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

• Tone: Pick an extreme (Brutalist, Luxury, Retro-futuristic, Editorial, Industrial).
• Motion: Use animations for effects and micro-interactions. Focus on high-impact moments (staggered page loads) rather than scattered micro-interactions.
• Differentiation: What makes this UNFORGETTABLE? What's the one thing someone will remember?

4. Output Requirements

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

• Production-grade: Functional, responsive, and accessible.
• Visually striking: Memorable and cohesive with a clear point-of-view.
• Technically compliant: Strictly follows the architecture in my-tech-stack.md.

5. Transition Integrity (No Stale UI)

For data-heavy views that switch entities (profile A → profile B), enforce deterministic transitions:

• Use a single render region (e.g., Streamlit's st.empty()) that replaces its entire content on each render pass.
• NEVER use dynamic keys (nonce, entity ID) on containers inside st.empty() — dynamic keys cause the framework to create new DOM nodes instead of replacing existing ones, leaving ghost/shadow copies visible for 1-2 seconds until frontend reconciliation catches up.
• Use stable keys on inner containers. The render region handles content replacement; inner containers just need stable identity for in-place DOM updates.
• Temporarily hide high-salience identity panels/tabs during loading to avoid ghosted prior-state flashes.
• Execute state transitions outside container context managers to avoid interrupted cleanup.

Acceptance rule: users must only perceive old state → loader → new state, with no stale intermediate artifacts.

6. Dial System — Design Variance Controls

Calibrate these three dials per project before writing any component. Declare them in a comment at the top of the main design file.

// DESIGN_VARIANCE: 7      // 1 (safe/corporate) → 10 (experimental/editorial)
// MOTION_INTENSITY: 5     // 1 (static) → 10 (cinematic)
// VISUAL_DENSITY: 4       // 1 (minimal/lots of space) → 10 (data-dense/information-heavy)

Dial	1–3	4–6	7–10
DESIGN_VARIANCE	Standard grid, safe palette	Distinctive but accessible	Experimental layout, bold choices
MOTION_INTENSITY	Opacity fade only	Entrance animations, hover states	Parallax, stagger, spring physics
VISUAL_DENSITY	Hero + CTA, generous whitespace	Cards with secondary info	Dashboard-style, compact rows

Rule: Do not override the user's declared dials. If undeclared, infer from context and state your assumption.

7. AI Tells — Forbidden Patterns

These are signals of generic AI output. Every instance must be eliminated:

Generic Names

• ❌ Company Name, Your Brand, Hello, World!, Example Corp
• ✅ Invent plausible, domain-specific content: Meridian Analytics, Kaspar & Voss, Orin Health

Fake Placeholder Numbers

• ❌ $1,234.56, 1,234 users, 99.9% uptime, 42 orders
• ✅ Domain-plausible numbers with realistic variance: $14,820, 3,241 customers, 99.4% uptime, 127 orders

AI Copywriting Clichés

• ❌ "Empowering your workflow", "Seamlessly integrated", "Next-generation solution", "Unlock the power of..."
• ✅ Specific, functional copy: "Track invoice aging in real time", "Filter by region, team, or date"

Oversaturated Accents

• ❌ #FF6B6B coral-pink, #6C63FF purple-blue gradient (the two default AI accent colors)
• ✅ Chosen from the brief or brand guide; if absent, pick something unexpected: amber, forest green, slate

Generic Iconography

• ❌ Rocket ship for launching, lightbulb for ideas, three horizontal bars for "menu" on desktop nav
• ✅ Icons that match the actual function; text labels as fallback if icon meaning is ambiguous

8. Typography Discipline

• Maximum 2 font families — one display (headings), one text (body + UI). Loading 3+ is a performance and taste failure.
• Optical sizing: Headings at 6rem+ need letter-spacing: -0.03em. Text under 0.875rem needs letter-spacing: 0.01em.
• Vertical rhythm: line-height: 1.6 for body, 1.1–1.2 for large headings, 1.4 for UI labels.
• Scale: Use a modular scale (1.25× or 1.333×), not arbitrary sizes. Common scale: 0.75 / 0.875 / 1 / 1.125 / 1.5 / 2 / 3 / 4.5rem.
• Weight contrast: Body at 400, labels at 500, headings at 700–800. Avoid using 4 or more weights.

/* Correct optical sizing */
.hero-heading {
  font-size: clamp(3rem, 6vw + 1rem, 6rem);
  line-height: 1.05;
  letter-spacing: -0.04em;
}
.body-text {
  font-size: 1rem;
  line-height: 1.625;
  letter-spacing: 0;
}

9. Color Calibration

• Maximum 1 accent color — two accents compete; zero creates bland work.
• Palette minimum: Background, Surface (+1 level of elevation), Text, Muted text, Border, Accent, Destructive.
• Forbidden: Purple/blue AI gradient cliché (from-purple-500 to-blue-600 or equivalent). Use if and only if the brand explicitly requires it.
• Dark mode: Shift background to hsl(220 15% 8%) range, not pure black (#000). Pure black with white text fails contrast for long reading.
• Accent contrast: Accent on background must pass WCAG AA (4.5:1 for normal text, 3:1 for large text / UI components).

/* ✅ Correct token setup */
:root {
  --bg: hsl(220 15% 97%);
  --surface: hsl(220 15% 100%);
  --text: hsl(220 25% 12%);
  --muted: hsl(220 10% 50%);
  --border: hsl(220 15% 88%);
  --accent: hsl(38 92% 50%);       /* Amber — unexpected, not AI-default */
  --destructive: hsl(0 72% 51%);
}

10. Layout Diversification

When DESIGN_VARIANCE > 4, ban the centered-hero-with-CTA default layout. Use instead:

Layout Pattern	When to Use
Editorial split — large text left, visual right (or reversed)	Brand/marketing pages
Bento grid — asymmetric tiles of varying sizes	Dashboards, feature showcases
Fullbleed scroll narrative — content revealed on scroll sections	Storytelling, case studies
Sidebar dock + content — persistent nav or filter rail	Application interfaces
Masonry — uneven column heights	Media, portfolio grids
Timeline / sequence — vertical progression with connectors	Onboarding, process flows

Never stack all sections centered on a 1200px max-width container unless DESIGN_VARIANCE ≤ 3.

11. Interactive State Completeness

Every interactive element must implement all four states before the component is done:

State	What to Implement
Loading	Skeleton, spinner, or disabled appearance while data fetches
Empty	Non-generic empty state with context-specific message + action
Error	Specific error message, retry action, not just "Something went wrong"
Tactile	Hover + active (pressed) visual feedback — scale, shadow, or color shift

// ✅ Complete interactive state example
function DataCard({ id }: { id: string }) {
  const { data, error, status } = useQuery(...)
  
  if (status === 'pending') return <CardSkeleton />
  if (status === 'error')   return <ErrorCard message={error.message} onRetry={refetch} />
  if (!data.items.length)   return <EmptyCard title="No records yet" action={<CreateButton />} />
  
  return (
    <div className="group transition-all hover:shadow-md hover:-translate-y-0.5 active:scale-[0.99]">
      {/* content */}
    </div>
  )
}

12. Data Realism

Never use placeholder data that signals the interface is unfinished:

❌ Avoid	✅ Use Instead
"Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet"	Domain-appropriate text: "Q3 revenue shows 14% growth vs prior quarter"
User: "John Doe"	Plausible name + avatar initial: "Margot Belleview"
Date: "January 1, 2024"	Recent plausible date: "Feb 12, 2026"
Metric: "1,234"	Realistic variance: "3,817" (not round numbers with too many digits)
Chart data: constant line	Realistic noise with trend: slight growth with variance

Rule: Each piece of sample data should make a reviewer believe it could be real production data, not a template. If the user provides real data patterns, use them precisely.