I Bolder

Increase visual impact and personality in designs that are too safe, generic, or visually underwhelming, creating more engaging and memorable experiences.

MANDATORY PREPARATION

Context Gathering (Do This First)

You cannot do a great job without having necessary context, such as target audience (critical), desired use-cases (critical), brand personality/tone, and everything else that a great human designer would need as well.

Attempt to gather these from the current thread or codebase.

1. If you don't find exact information and have to infer from existing design and functionality, you MUST STOP and ask the user directly to clarify what you cannot infer. whether you got it right.
2. Otherwise, if you can't fully infer or your level of confidence is medium or lower, you MUST ask the user directly to clarify what you cannot infer. clarifying questions first to complete your context.

Do NOT proceed until you have answers. Guessing leads to generic AI slop.

Use frontend-design skill

Use the i-frontend-design skill for design principles and anti-patterns. Do NOT proceed until it has executed and you know all DO's and DON'Ts.

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Assess Current State

Analyze what makes the design feel too safe or boring:

1. Identify weakness sources:

   • Generic choices: System fonts, basic colors, standard layouts
   • Timid scale: Everything is medium-sized with no drama
   • Low contrast: Everything has similar visual weight
   • Static: No motion, no energy, no life
   • Predictable: Standard patterns with no surprises
   • Flat hierarchy: Nothing stands out or commands attention

2. Understand the context:

   • What's the brand personality? (How far can we push?)
   • What's the purpose? (Marketing can be bolder than financial dashboards)
   • Who's the audience? (What will resonate?)
   • What are the constraints? (Brand guidelines, accessibility, performance)

If any of these are unclear from the codebase, ask the user directly to clarify what you cannot infer.

CRITICAL: "Bolder" doesn't mean chaotic or garish. It means distinctive, memorable, and confident. Think intentional drama, not random chaos.

WARNING - AI SLOP TRAP: When making things "bolder," AI defaults to the same tired tricks: cyan/purple gradients, glassmorphism, neon accents on dark backgrounds, gradient text on metrics. These are the OPPOSITE of bold—they're generic. Review ALL the DON'T guidelines in the i-frontend-design skill before proceeding. Bold means distinctive, not "more effects."

Plan Amplification

Create a strategy to increase impact while maintaining coherence:

• Focal point: What should be the hero moment? (Pick ONE, make it amazing)
• Personality direction: Maximalist chaos? Elegant drama? Playful energy? Dark moody? Choose a lane.
• Risk budget: How experimental can we be? Push boundaries within constraints.
• Hierarchy amplification: Make big things BIGGER, small things smaller (increase contrast)

IMPORTANT: Bold design must still be usable. Impact without function is just decoration.

Amplify the Design

Systematically increase impact across these dimensions:

Typography Amplification

• Replace generic fonts: Swap system fonts for distinctive choices (see frontend-design skill for inspiration)
• Extreme scale: Create dramatic size jumps (3x-5x differences, not 1.5x)
• Weight contrast: Pair 900 weights with 200 weights, not 600 with 400
• Unexpected choices: Variable fonts, display fonts for headlines, condensed/extended widths, monospace as intentional accent (not as lazy "dev tool" default)

Color Intensification

• Increase saturation: Shift to more vibrant, energetic colors (but not neon)
• Bold palette: Introduce unexpected color combinations—avoid the purple-blue gradient AI slop
• Dominant color strategy: Let one bold color own 60% of the design
• Sharp accents: High-contrast accent colors that pop
• Tinted neutrals: Replace pure grays with tinted grays that harmonize with your palette
• Rich gradients: Intentional multi-stop gradients (not generic purple-to-blue)