Presentations that don't look like a robot made them

00Before you start

Three things, none of them code

Nothing here needs you to know how to program. The whole point is that you are instructing an assistant, not writing software.

• Claude Code, installed and working in a terminal.
• A folder for this project. It can be empty.
• Your real material — notes, data, whatever brand rules you have. Messy is fine and expected.

There is no second tool to sign up for. That is the whole argument: the third step — a dedicated AI slide product stacked on top of the AI you already pay for — is the one you get to delete.

01One-time setup1:44

Install design skills

Design skills are shared folders of design knowledge that people have built specifically to teach Claude good design instincts. You point Claude Code at one and ask it to install it.

1. Find a design-skills repository you trust.
2. Copy its link.
3. Paste the link straight into the Claude Code chat.
4. Tell it what you want done with it.

I want to install these repositories. Can you do that for me?

Claude reads the repository, scans it, and installs it. You can scope it to the current project only, or install it globally so every project from that point forward already has the design skill baked in.

Three good ones to start with

Any of these will move the needle on their own. Together they cover direction, craft and reference.

What this actually changes2:52

It gives Claude judgment it wouldn't have by default: spacing rules, layout principles, and real typography pairing instead of picking whatever font is technically available. Just as importantly, it gives Claude a list of what not to do.

You only do this once. It isn't something you redo every time you sit down to build.

02Messy is the point3:46

Gather your real input

Real-world content is never clean. Nobody hands you a perfectly organised, bullet-pointed brief with everything labelled and ready to go.

Drop all three into the Claude Code chat in your project folder.

03Plain language, hard constraints5:24

Write the prompt

One prompt does most of the work. Swap in your own data, notes and brand guidelines and it holds up the same way.

Using the data, notes and brand guidelines I provided, build a fully
interactive presentation as a single self-contained HTML file.

Design it from scratch. Do not use a generic template layout.

Follow the brand guidelines exactly for colour palette and typography.

If you want to leave less to chance

The short version works because the design skills are already doing the heavy lifting. When the stakes are higher — a client deck, a board update — spell the constraints out and let nothing be inferred.

Using the data, notes and brand guidelines I provided, build a fully
interactive presentation as a single self-contained HTML file.

Design it from scratch. Do not use a generic template layout.

Follow the brand guidelines exactly for colour palette and typography.
Pair the typefaces deliberately rather than defaulting to whatever is
available.

Work out the story the numbers tell before you build anything, then
build slides that carry that story. Do not dump data onto slides.

Make it mobile responsive, and check it at phone width before you tell
me it is finished.

Do not centre everything on the page. Do not use a purple-to-blue
gradient. Do not use the same sans-serif every AI-generated deck uses.

When you are done, open it in the browser, click through every
interactive element, and fix anything that is broken.

Why it works

• It's specific about what not to do, not just what to do.
• It tells Claude to think about the narrative instead of dumping data onto slides.
• It leans on the brand guidelines and the design skills you already set up.
• It asks for one self-contained file, so there's nothing to assemble afterwards.

04Go do something else7:09

What happens while it builds

Claude starts reading your source files, asks permission where it needs it, and gets to work. You don't have to sit and watch.

1. Reads the source files

   Works through your notes, data and brand guidelines.

2. Builds the presentation

   A single self-contained HTML file, designed from scratch.

   7:52
3. Checks its own work in a browser

   Opens it up, clicks through, tests the interactivity.

   8:32
4. Fixes what's broken on mobile

   The skills told it the output must be mobile responsive, so it checks and corrects without being asked again.

   9:16

05Your job, not Claude's9:40

Verify the output

AI is not perfect. We're not there yet. You still have to go through and double-check the work — you're just spending far less time than you would building from scratch.

06The tells

The don't list

If your output has these, the design skills either aren't installed or aren't being used.

07Same input, different ask

Beyond slides

Once your material is in there, the rest is just a conversation. The presentation is one option out of several — ask for what you actually need.