Starter Design skill
Design basics
Teach visual design by fixing something the person is making.
Teach design to someone with no training, and the lesson is their own artifact — a page, slide, poster, or profile they are making right now. No theory session first. Open the thing, fix it together, and name each principle at the moment it fixes something.
Get the artifact
Ask what they are working on. If nothing is open, have them pick the most recent thing they made that they wish looked better. A screenshot works. If they truly have nothing, build a one-page version of something real — a club announcement, a bio page — and teach on that. Never demonstrate on fake content.
The four moves
Work through these in order, on their artifact, one change at a time. Show the before and after of each change so they see the difference, and let them accept or reject it — their taste decides.
- Hierarchy. Ask: what should a stranger see first, second, third? Make size and weight match that answer. Usually this means one thing gets bigger and everything else gets smaller. One-liner to teach: if everything is emphasized, nothing is.
- Spacing. Double the whitespace around the most important element. Group related things tightly, push unrelated things apart. Teach: space is information — gaps tell the eye what belongs together.
- Alignment. Pick one intentional alignment (often a left edge) and snap related elements to it. Teach: invisible straight lines are what make a layout feel intentional.
- Contrast. Check text against its background — if they squint and it disappears, darken or lighten it. One strong accent color at most. Teach: contrast is for the one thing that matters.
After each move, ask if it looks better to them and why. If they prefer their original, keep it and say what the trade-off is in one line. Do not win arguments; explain and move on.
The subtraction pass
End by removing things: extra fonts down to two, extra colors down to two plus an accent, borders and shadows that decorate without separating anything. Each removal, one line on why. Most amateur design fails by addition; make them feel the artifact getting calmer as things leave.
--- name: design-basics category: design description: Teach visual design by fixing something the person is making. Hierarchy, spacing, alignment, and contrast, applied live to their own artifact. Use when they say "this looks bad and I don't know why", "make it look better", or "teach me design". --- # design-basics Teach design to someone with no training, and the lesson is their own artifact — a page, slide, poster, or profile they are making right now. No theory session first. Open the thing, fix it together, and name each principle at the moment it fixes something. ## Get the artifact Ask what they are working on. If nothing is open, have them pick the most recent thing they made that they wish looked better. A screenshot works. If they truly have nothing, build a one-page version of something real — a club announcement, a bio page — and teach on that. Never demonstrate on fake content. ## The four moves Work through these in order, on their artifact, one change at a time. Show the before and after of each change so they see the difference, and let them accept or reject it — their taste decides. 1. Hierarchy. Ask: what should a stranger see first, second, third? Make size and weight match that answer. Usually this means one thing gets bigger and everything else gets smaller. One-liner to teach: if everything is emphasized, nothing is. 2. Spacing. Double the whitespace around the most important element. Group related things tightly, push unrelated things apart. Teach: space is information — gaps tell the eye what belongs together. 3. Alignment. Pick one intentional alignment (often a left edge) and snap related elements to it. Teach: invisible straight lines are what make a layout feel intentional. 4. Contrast. Check text against its background — if they squint and it disappears, darken or lighten it. One strong accent color at most. Teach: contrast is for the one thing that matters. After each move, ask if it looks better to them and why. If they prefer their original, keep it and say what the trade-off is in one line. Do not win arguments; explain and move on. ## The subtraction pass End by removing things: extra fonts down to two, extra colors down to two plus an accent, borders and shadows that decorate without separating anything. Each removal, one line on why. Most amateur design fails by addition; make them feel the artifact getting calmer as things leave. ## Done - Their real artifact, visibly better, saved or exported in the format they need - They can name the four moves and point to where each one happened on their own work - A three-line note (in the file or a comment) recording the fonts, colors, and spacing unit now in use, so the next edit stays consistent If they want to go further, suggest pick-fonts-and-colors for the palette or design-critique to practice judging work.