design-crit

Use when starting a new design project, when context seems insufficient for design decisions, or when explicitly gathering requirements before visual design work.

Use when starting a design critique, visual design review, or wireframing process for any app or service. Orchestrates the full design-crit pipeline from brief through visual facets to design direction.

Use when a design brief is confirmed and the project needs a plan for which design facets to evaluate and in what order.

Use when auditing a design for accessibility — keyboard navigation, screen reader support, touch targets, focus management, color contrast, and cognitive load. Typically runs as the last facet to audit accumulated decisions.

Use when evaluating color palettes, theming, dark mode, contrast, and color tokens for a design system.

Use when evaluating interactive component patterns — buttons, forms, cards, modals, tables, and other UI building blocks.

Use when evaluating information hierarchy within screens — what's prominent, what's secondary, and how the user's eye is guided through content.

Use when evaluating microcopy, error messages, CTA language, terminology consistency, and the overall voice and tone of UI text.

Use when a project needs a design facet not covered by the pre-built facet library. Provides crit loop mechanics with design principles but no domain-specific guidance.

Use when evaluating chart types, data display patterns, dashboard layouts, and how data is visually communicated to users.

Use when evaluating information density, whitespace, spacing systems, and compact vs comfortable modes in a design.

Use when designing empty states, error handling, offline behavior, loading content, and boundary conditions for an app's screens.

Use when evaluating depth, layering, shadow systems, surface treatments, and shape language (border radius, corner treatment) in a design.

Use when evaluating icon systems, visual metaphors, icon style consistency, and symbolic language in a design.

Use when evaluating photography style, illustration systems, hero visuals, and decorative imagery for a product or marketing site.

Use when evaluating page layout, grid systems, spatial composition, and how content areas relate to each other within screens.

Use when evaluating loading states, perceived performance patterns, skeleton screens, optimistic UI, and progress indicators.

Use when evaluating animation, transitions, micro-interactions, and motion design in a user interface.

Use when evaluating navigation patterns, wayfinding, menu structures, and how users move between screens in an app.

Use when evaluating first-run experience, progressive disclosure, onboarding tutorials, and how new users learn to use the product.

Use when evaluating how a design adapts across screen sizes and devices — breakpoint strategy, layout reflow, and touch vs pointer adaptation.

Use when identifying and evaluating the complete set of screens, states, and user flows for an app or service. Usually the first facet in a design crit.

Use when evaluating font selection, type scale, typographic hierarchy, and text readability in a design.

Use when all design facets are locked and the crit is ready to be synthesized into a final design direction document with deliverables.