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Architecture Designer

A principal-architect skill that walks you from requirements to architecture diagrams and ADRs with explicit trade-offs.

Dev & CodingIntermediate★ 11,719⑂ 1,132AI score 8/10Last updated: Oct 3, 2026

What it does

  • Gathers functional, non-functional and constraint requirements before any design work starts.
  • Matches requirements to architectural patterns (monolith vs microservices, event-driven, etc.).
  • Produces a high-level architecture diagram in Mermaid syntax.
  • Writes Architecture Decision Records with Context, Decision, Alternatives, Consequences and Trade-offs.
  • Pulls in reference docs on demand: architecture patterns, ADR template, system design template, database selection, NFR checklist.
  • Enforces guardrails such as "evaluate trade-offs, not just benefits" and "don't over-engineer for hypothetical scale".

Who it's for

  • Backend/fullstack engineers who have to own architecture decisions on a new service.
  • Tech leads who need to justify technology choices in writing to teams or stakeholders.
  • Teams adopting an ADR practice but lacking a consistent format.

Example uses

  1. "Design the backend for a commerce app with orders, payments and notifications" → requirements summary, Mermaid diagram, technology recommendations, risk list.
  2. "Write an ADR comparing PostgreSQL and DynamoDB for the Order Service" → a complete ADR draft with alternatives and consequences.
  3. "Should we split our monolith into microservices?" → a trade-off analysis that factors in operational complexity and cost.

· · · Install guide · · ·

Try it now, no install

Paste this into Claude to use the skill without installing anything.

Read the instructions in this file and follow them to help me:
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Jeffallan/claude-skills/HEAD/skills/architecture-designer/SKILL.md

What I want: (describe your task here)

If Claude can't open the link, open it yourself and paste the contents instead.

↓ If it works for you, download the ZIP below and install it. Then it runs on its own — no pasting each time.

Install in the Claude app (no terminal)
  1. Download the ZIP with the button below.
  2. In Claude, open Settings → Capabilities and turn on 'Code execution and file creation'. (one time)
  3. Go to Customize → Skills → + → 'Upload a skill' and upload the ZIP.
↓ Download ZIP
Install in Claude Code

Let Claude do it — paste this into Claude Code

Install the skill I found on Claude Skill Mart.
Copy the skills/architecture-designer folder from the GitHub repo Jeffallan/claude-skills into my ~/.claude/skills/architecture-designer/.
When it's done, tell me in one line what this skill can do.

Install with a command instead

git clone https://github.com/Jeffallan/claude-skills.git /tmp/claude-skills && mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills && cp -r /tmp/claude-skills/skills/architecture-designer ~/.claude/skills/

⚠ This is a third-party skill. Check the source repository before installing.

  1. Open a terminal.
  2. Clone the repository: git clone https://github.com/Jeffallan/claude-skills.git
  3. Create the skills directory: mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills
  4. Copy the whole skill folder so the reference docs come with it: cp -r claude-skills/skills/architecture-designer ~/.claude/skills/
  5. Verify with ls ~/.claude/skills/architecture-designer — you should see SKILL.md and a references/ folder.
  6. Restart Claude Code and ask something like "design the architecture for a new system" to trigger the skill.
View source on GitHub ↗License: MIT