Design & Handoff¶
This page covers the first two stages of the pipeline: deciding whether a feature needs Claude Design at all, and what crosses over into implementation once it does.
When to use Claude Design¶
Claude Design comes first for medium-to-large features where the fundamental UX is at stake — where the shape of the interaction itself is still an open question. A bug fix, a copy change, or a new field on an existing form goes straight to implementation: the interaction already has a shape, and the change does not alter it.
The test is not how large the change is in lines of code. A large change that fits an established pattern skips design; a small change that introduces a genuinely new interaction does not.
The handoff package¶
A design leaves Claude Design as a handoff package, not as code. It contains:
- the design itself
- standalone HTML
- screenshots
- a README
- a PROMPT
Two rules govern how a handoff package is used, both learned in practice.
The handoff folder's files are the single source of truth for that piece of work — not a same-named or similar-looking file already in the application. The two often share a shape and a plausible location, and mistaking one for the other means designing against the wrong data.
The handoff folder is briefing material, not repository content. Port what it specifies into the real source files and leave the folder untracked, or remove it before the final commit. It has done its job once implementation starts; it does not belong in the commit history alongside it.
From here, implementation itself is Working with Claude Code, the next page in this subsection.