Sketch

Throwaway HTML mockups: 2-3 design variants to compare.

Skill metadata

Source	Bundled (installed by default)
Path	skills/creative/sketch
Version	1.0.0
Author	Hermes Agent (adapted from gsd-build/get-shit-done)
License	MIT
Tags	sketch, mockup, design, ui, prototype, html, variants, exploration, wireframe, comparison
Related skills	spike, claude-design, popular-web-designs, excalidraw

Reference: full SKILL.md

info

The following is the complete skill definition that Hermes loads when this skill is triggered. This is what the agent sees as instructions when the skill is active.

Sketch

Use this skill when the user wants to see a design direction before committing to one — exploring a UI/UX idea as disposable HTML mockups. The point is to generate 2-3 interactive variants so the user can compare visual directions side-by-side, not to produce shippable code.

Load this when the user says things like "sketch this screen", "show me what X could look like", "compare layout A vs B", "give me 2-3 takes on this UI", "let me see some variants", "mockup this before I build".

When NOT to use this

• User wants a production component — use claude-design or build it properly
• User wants a polished one-off HTML artifact (landing page, deck) — claude-design
• User wants a diagram — excalidraw, architecture-diagram
• The design is already locked — just build it

If the user has the full GSD system installed

If gsd-sketch shows up as a sibling skill (installed via npx get-shit-done-cc --hermes), prefer gsd-sketch for the full workflow: persistent .planning/sketches/ with MANIFEST, frontier mode analysis, consistency audits across past sketches, and integration with the rest of GSD. This skill is the lightweight standalone version — one-off sketching without the state machinery.

Core method

intake  →  variants  →  head-to-head  →  pick winner (or iterate)

1. Intake (skip if the user already gave you enough)

Before generating variants, get three things — one question at a time, not all at once:

1. Feel. "What should this feel like? Adjectives, emotions, a vibe." — "calm, editorial, like Linear" tells you more than "minimal".
2. References. "What apps, sites, or products capture the feel you're imagining?" — actual references beat abstract descriptions.
3. Core action. "What's the single most important thing a user does on this screen?" — the variants should all serve this well; if they don't, they're just decoration.

Reflect each answer briefly before the next question. If the user already gave you all three upfront, skip straight to variants.

2. Variants (2-3, never 1, rarely 4+)

Produce 2-3 variants in one go. Each variant is a complete, standalone HTML file. Don't describe variants — build them. The point is comparison.

Each variant should take a different design stance, not different pixel values. Three good variant axes:

• Density: compact / airy / ultra-dense (pick two contrasting poles)
• Emphasis: content-first / action-first / tool-first
• Aesthetic: editorial / utilitarian / playful
• Layout: single-column / sidebar / split-pane
• Grounding: card-based / bare-content / document-style

Pick one axis and pull apart from it. Two variants that differ only in accent color are wasted effort — the user can't distinguish them.

Variant naming: describe the stance, not the number.

sketches/
├── 001-calm-editorial/
│   ├── index.html
│   └── README.md
├── 001-utilitarian-dense/
│   ├── index.html
│   └── README.md
└── 001-playful-split/
    ├── index.html
    └── README.md

3. Make them real HTML

Each variant is a single self-contained HTML file:

• Inline <style> — no build step, no external CSS
• System fonts or one Google Font via <link>
• Tailwind via CDN (<script src="https://cdn.tailwindcss.com"></script>) is fine
• Realistic fake content — actual sentences, actual names, not "Lorem ipsum"
• Interactive: links clickable, hovers real, at least one state transition (open/close, filter, toggle). A frozen static image is a worse spike than a sloppy animated one.

Open it in a browser. If it looks broken, fix it before showing the user.

Verify variants visually — use Hermes' browser tools. Don't just write HTML and hope it renders; load each variant and look at it:

browser_navigate(url="file:///absolute/path/to/sketches/001-calm-editorial/index.html")
browser_vision(question="Does this layout look clean and readable? Any visible bugs (overlapping text, unstyled elements, broken images)?")

browser_vision returns an AI description of what's actually on the page plus a screenshot path — catches layout bugs that pure source inspection misses (e.g. a font import that silently failed, a flex container that collapsed). Fix and re-navigate until each variant looks right.

Default CSS reset + system font stack for fast starts:

<style>
  * { box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0; padding: 0; }
  body {
    font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, "Segoe UI", Roboto,
                 "Helvetica Neue", Arial, sans-serif;
    -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased;
    color: #1a1a1a;
    background: #fafafa;
    line-height: 1.5;
  }
</style>

4. Variant README

Each variant's README.md answers:

## Variant: {stance name}

### Design stance
One sentence on the principle driving this variant.

### Key choices
- Layout: ...
- Typography: ...
- Color: ...
- Interaction: ...

### Trade-offs
- Strong at: ...
- Weak at: ...

### Best for
- The kind of user or use case this variant actually serves

5. Head-to-head

After all variants are built, present them as a comparison. Don't just list — opinionate:

## Three takes on the home screen

| Dimension | Calm editorial | Utilitarian dense | Playful split |
|-----------|----------------|-------------------|---------------|
| Density   | Low            | High              | Medium        |
| Primary action visibility | Low | High | Medium |
| Scan-ability | High | Medium | Low |
| Feel | Calm, trusted | Sharp, tool-like | Inviting, energetic |

**My take:** Utilitarian dense for power users, calm editorial for content-forward audiences. Playful split is weakest — tries to do both and commits to neither.

Let the user pick a winner, or combine two into a hybrid, or ask for another round.

Theming (when the project has a visual identity)

If the user has an existing theme (colors, fonts, tokens), put shared tokens in sketches/themes/tokens.css and @import them in each variant. Keep tokens minimal:

/* sketches/themes/tokens.css */
:root {
  --color-bg: #fafafa;
  --color-fg: #1a1a1a;
  --color-accent: #0066ff;
  --color-muted: #666;
  --radius: 8px;
  --font-display: "Inter", sans-serif;
  --font-body: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, sans-serif;
}

Don't over-tokenize a throwaway sketch — three colors and one font is usually enough.

Interactivity bar

A sketch is interactive enough when the user can:

1. Click a primary action and something visible happens (state change, modal, toast, navigation feint)
2. See one meaningful state transition (filter a list, toggle a mode, open/close a panel)
3. Hover recognizable affordances (buttons, rows, tabs)

More than that is over-engineering a throwaway. Less than that is a screenshot.

Frontier mode (picking what to sketch next)

If sketches already exist and the user says "what should I sketch next?":

• Consistency gaps — two winning variants from different sketches made independent choices that haven't been composed together yet
• Unsketched screens — referenced but never explored
• State coverage — happy path sketched, but not empty / loading / error / 1000-items
• Responsive gaps — validated at one viewport; does it hold at mobile / ultrawide?
• Interaction patterns — static layouts exist; transitions, drag, scroll behavior don't

Propose 2-4 named candidates. Let the user pick.

Output

• Create sketches/ (or .planning/sketches/ if the user is using GSD conventions) in the repo root
• One subdir per variant: NNN-stance-name/index.html + README.md
• Tell the user how to open them: open sketches/001-calm-editorial/index.html on macOS, xdg-open on Linux, start on Windows
• Keep variants disposable — a sketch that you felt the need to preserve should be promoted into real project code, not curated as an asset

Typical tool sequence for one variant:

terminal("mkdir -p sketches/001-calm-editorial")
write_file("sketches/001-calm-editorial/index.html", "<!doctype html>...")
write_file("sketches/001-calm-editorial/README.md", "## Variant: Calm editorial\n...")
browser_navigate(url="file://$(pwd)/sketches/001-calm-editorial/index.html")
browser_vision(question="How does this look? Any obvious layout issues?")

Repeat for each variant, then present the comparison table.

Attribution

Adapted from the GSD (Get Shit Done) project's /gsd-sketch workflow — MIT © 2025 Lex Christopherson (gsd-build/get-shit-done). The full GSD system ships persistent sketch state, theme/variant pattern references, and consistency-audit workflows; install with npx get-shit-done-cc --hermes --global.