brand-guidelines

Overview of brand-guidelines skill

What the brand-guidelines skill does

The brand-guidelines skill gives an AI agent a compact, reusable set of Anthropic visual brand rules so it can restyle documents and artifacts with the right colors, typography, and overall look. In practice, this is a post-processing and formatting skill: you use it when the content is already drafted and now needs to look like it belongs inside Anthropic's brand system.

Who should install brand-guidelines

This brand-guidelines skill is best for people generating branded deliverables such as slides, one-pagers, internal docs, visual mockups, landing page copy blocks, or structured content that will later be rendered into HTML, Markdown, design specs, or presentation formats. It is most useful if you want an agent to apply a consistent house style without re-explaining the palette and font choices every time.

The real job-to-be-done

Most users do not need “branding theory.” They need an agent to take a rough artifact and make concrete styling decisions fast: which colors to use, which fonts to assign to headings vs body text, what contrast direction fits the background, and how to preserve hierarchy while making the result feel on-brand. The brand-guidelines for Branding use case is exactly that operational handoff.

What makes this skill different from a normal prompt

A normal prompt like “make this look on-brand” is vague and drifts. brand-guidelines is better when you want the model anchored to explicit brand tokens:

• defined hex colors
• named heading and body fonts
• fallback fonts
• a clear Anthropic-specific styling target

That reduces guesswork and makes output more repeatable across runs.

Important limitations before you install

This is a lightweight skill, not a full design system package. The repository provides the central brand rules, but no helper scripts, sample templates, or validation tooling. That means the skill is strong as a reference layer for an agent, but you still need to supply the artifact type, output format, and any layout constraints yourself.

How to Use brand-guidelines skill

Install context for brand-guidelines skill

Install brand-guidelines through the Anthropic skills repository in the environment where your agent can access skills. A common pattern is:

npx skills add https://github.com/anthropics/skills --skill brand-guidelines

Because the upstream skill is only a single SKILL.md plus license file, installation is simple, but usage quality depends heavily on your prompt and target format.

Read these files first

For brand-guidelines install evaluation, read:

• skills/brand-guidelines/SKILL.md
• skills/brand-guidelines/LICENSE.txt

There are no supporting resources/, scripts/, or examples to inspect, so nearly all useful behavior comes from understanding SKILL.md well and then prompting around its gaps.

What inputs the skill needs from you

The skill does not know what artifact you are styling unless you tell it. Strong inputs usually include:

• artifact type: slide deck, webpage section, PDF brief, infographic, memo
• output format: Markdown, HTML, CSS suggestions, presentation outline, design spec
• audience: internal team, executives, customers, developers
• tone: formal, educational, product-focused, launch-oriented
• constraints: dark mode, printable, accessible contrast, limited accent use
• what already exists: raw copy, headings, wireframe, layout notes

Without those, the model may apply colors and fonts correctly but still produce an output that is unusable in your actual workflow.

Brand tokens the skill is built around

The core brand-guidelines usage value comes from these rules:

• main colors: #141413, #faf9f5, #b0aea5, #e8e6dc
• accent colors: #d97757, #6a9bcc, #788c5d
• headings: Poppins with Arial fallback
• body text: Lora with Georgia fallback

It also signals that headings at 24pt+ should use the heading treatment and that readability should be preserved across systems.

Best workflow: content first, styling second

Use brand-guidelines after core writing or structuring is done. A reliable workflow is:

1. Draft the content.
2. Decide the target medium.
3. Invoke brand-guidelines to restyle and map brand decisions.
4. Review contrast, font availability, and output practicality.
5. Ask for one tighter revision tuned to your renderer or tool.

This avoids wasting time having the model invent content and brand formatting at the same time.

How to turn a rough request into a strong prompt

Weak prompt:

• “Make this look like Anthropic.”

Better prompt:

• “Using the brand-guidelines skill, restyle this one-page product brief for a dark-on-light PDF layout. Keep copy unchanged. Apply Anthropic brand colors conservatively, use Poppins for headings and Lora for body text with fallbacks, suggest heading levels, callout styles, and a palette assignment for headings, body text, dividers, and emphasis text. Optimize for readability and executive review.”

The stronger version gives the model a medium, scope, and success criteria.

Prompt pattern for HTML or CSS outputs

If you need implementation-ready output, ask explicitly for structured deliverables. Example:

• “Use brand-guidelines to produce a small HTML/CSS styling spec for this landing page section. Return color variables, font stack declarations, heading/body assignments, and one example component style using Anthropic brand colors. Prefer accessible contrast and avoid overusing accent colors.”

This is better than asking for “design ideas,” because it yields code-adjacent output you can actually apply.

Prompt pattern for docs and slides

For presentations or docs, ask the agent to map content hierarchy to brand treatment:

• title slide/title block color choice
• heading sizes and font assignment
• body text font and spacing
• accent usage rules for charts, quotes, or callouts
• background recommendations for light vs dark sections

That gives the brand-guidelines guide practical shape rather than leaving it at a palette list.

Practical quality tips that matter

A few details materially improve results:

• Tell the model whether Poppins and Lora are available in your environment.
• If they are not, ask it to design around the fallbacks from the start.
• Specify whether you want subtle brand application or visible branded styling.
• Ask it to limit accents to one or two colors if the artifact should stay professional and restrained.
• If accessibility matters, ask for contrast-conscious choices, especially on dark backgrounds.

Misuse patterns to avoid

Do not use brand-guidelines skill as if it were:

• a logo kit
• a complete Figma system
• a UI component library
• a legal brand compliance checker

It gives a usable styling baseline, not full approval-grade brand governance.

brand-guidelines skill FAQ

Is brand-guidelines only for Anthropic-branded outputs?

Yes, primarily. The skill is explicitly centered on Anthropic's brand colors and typography. If you need a neutral design assistant or another company's style system, this is the wrong fit unless you are borrowing the workflow pattern rather than the actual brand rules.

Is brand-guidelines useful for beginners?

Yes, especially if you are not a designer but still need a model to make fewer arbitrary visual choices. The skill lowers the chance of random font/color combinations. Beginners will still get better results if they specify the artifact type and desired output format.

How is this better than putting brand colors in my own prompt?

For one-off use, a custom prompt can be enough. The advantage of brand-guidelines usage is consistency and faster invocation. You do not need to restate the palette and font hierarchy each time, and the agent has a clearer default target.

When should I not install brand-guidelines?

Skip brand-guidelines install if:

• you need multi-brand support
• you need templates or sample assets
• you need strict accessibility auditing
• you are doing deep UI design rather than lightweight branded formatting
• your environment cannot render or approximate the specified fonts and that matters to the final output

Does the skill generate final design files?

No. Based on the repository, it provides guidance and styling rules, not exportable design assets or automated transformations. Think of it as a specialized style reference for the agent.

Does brand-guidelines work outside documents?

Yes, but best on text-led artifacts. It can inform HTML sections, slide structures, content cards, simple component specs, and presentation styling. It is less complete for advanced product UI systems, illustration direction, or production-ready design handoff.

How to Improve brand-guidelines skill

Give the brand-guidelines skill a concrete rendering target

The fastest way to improve brand-guidelines output is to specify where the styled result will live:

• web page
• Markdown doc
• Google Slides outline
• printable PDF
• design brief
• email

The same palette can produce very different recommendations depending on the medium.

Provide hierarchy, not just raw text

If you paste an undifferentiated block of content, the model must guess which lines are headings, subheads, pull quotes, and body copy. Mark those explicitly or ask the model to classify them first. This makes font and emphasis application much more reliable.

State your brand intensity preference

One common failure mode is over-branding: too many accents, too much contrast, or every element feeling highlighted. Improve results by asking for:

• “subtle”
• “balanced”
• “presentation-grade”
• “high-brand visibility”

That gives the model a usable threshold for color usage.

Handle font availability early

The upstream skill notes that fonts should be pre-installed for best results. If your stack does not have Poppins and Lora, say so. Ask for fallback-first styling or equivalent hierarchy using Arial and Georgia. This avoids outputs that look good in theory but break in practice.

Ask for a style map, not just a rewrite

A high-value iteration prompt is:

• “Using brand-guidelines, produce a style map for this content: heading font, body font, text colors, background colors, divider colors, callout treatment, and one example of accent usage. Then restyle the content using that map.”

This forces the model to externalize decisions, making them easier to review and correct.

Correct the first pass with targeted feedback

Do not say only “make it better.” Say what failed:

• accent color too heavy
• hierarchy too flat
• dark background feels too dense
• body text too decorative
• insufficient contrast
• looks like marketing when it should feel editorial

Targeted feedback improves the second pass far more than general dissatisfaction.

Pair brand-guidelines with structure-oriented skills or prompts

brand-guidelines for Branding works best after content structure is already sound. If your headings, section order, or message hierarchy are weak, fix those first. The skill improves presentation, not underlying communication strategy.

Keep a reusable house prompt on top of the skill

If you use this often, create a short wrapper prompt with your recurring constraints, such as:

• “default to light backgrounds”
• “use only one accent color per page”
• “prefer restrained executive style”
• “return CSS variables when possible”

This makes the brand-guidelines guide more operational for repeated team use.

Know when to graduate beyond the skill

If your team needs component libraries, accessibility checks, template generation, or design QA, brand-guidelines skill should become one input into a larger workflow, not the whole workflow. Its value is speed and consistency at the brand-rule layer, not full design automation.