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open-design

open-design

github.com/podoDesign & UI29171 installsUpdated 3d ago
Repository

About open-design

open-design is a local-first design application for people creating visual assets and prototypes with coding agents or a BYOK model API key. It combines design skills, templates, systems and sandboxed previews, with an MCP server for agent access to projects.

Key features

  1. 01Local daemon with web and optional desktop app
  2. 02Catalogue of design skills and templates
  3. 03Sandboxed previews of generated files
  4. 04Outputs for prototypes, dashboards, decks and more
  5. 05Coding-agent CLI or BYOK API key support

Use cases

  1. 01Generate a web prototype or SaaS landing page
  2. 02Create dashboards or mobile onboarding flows
  3. 03Produce decks, email templates or social carousels

MCP support

Its MCP server lets connected agents read Open Design projects. Coding agents can connect using `od mcp install` or the app's MCP settings.

Install

Copy the command and run it in a terminal.

$npx skills add https://github.com/podo/design-agent-skills --skill open-design

After installing, type/open-designin Claude Code to confirm it loaded.

Bundled filesstub.yaml

Details

From the project README

open-design

Catalogue stub — full platform: nexu-io/open-design

Install

Open Design is an application (a local daemon with a web UI, an optional desktop app and an MCP server), not a skill the skills CLI can install. Pick one route. Desktop app (macOS Apple Silicon or Intel, Windows x64): download it from open-design.ai or github.com/nexu-io/open-design/releases; no Node, pnpm or clone needed. From source (the only route on Linux; needs Node ~24 and pnpm 10.33.x): git clone https://github.com/nexu-io/open-design.git && cd open-design && corepack enable && pnpm install && pnpm tools-dev run web, then open the URL it prints (the repository is about 3.4 GB, so add --depth 1 to the clone to shorten the download). Inside your own coding agent: run od mcp install claude (use codex, cursor, opencode and so on for other agents) to connect it to Open Design over MCP; on a macOS desktop install od can resolve to /usr/bin/od (octal dump), so copy the snippet from Settings, MCP server in the app instead.

Heads-up

  • Requires: a coding-agent CLI on your PATH (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor Agent and others) or a BYOK model API key set in the app's Settings; Node ~24 and pnpm 10.33.x, only for the from-source route
  • License: Apache-2.0

Invoke after install

Once an agent is connected over MCP, ask it in plain language, for example "Use open-design to generate a landing page with the Linear design system". In the desktop or web app, type a brief in the entry view, choose a runtime, a design template and a design system, and press Send. The daemon prints its local URL when it starts (from source, development ports are allocated dynamically).

What it does

A local-first design product. It detects the coding-agent CLIs on your PATH (or uses a BYOK API key), loads a large catalogue of functional design skills, rendering templates and design systems, and streams the generated files into a sandboxed preview. Output covers web prototypes, SaaS landing pages, dashboards, mobile onboarding flows, decks, email templates, social carousels, posters, motion frames and sprite animation. Self-hosted, with no vendor lock-in, and an MCP server so other agents can read your Open Design projects.

When NOT to use

  • Single-skill tasks where the platform overhead isn't warranted (install the individual skill directly, for example design-brief for briefs)
  • Cloud-only environments (CI, serverless) or machines where you cannot run a persistent local process
  • Linux desktops expecting a prebuilt app (there is none yet; the from-source route is the only one)

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