What
This project was a test against a hypothesis. I wanted to see if I can plan, design, deploy, and maintain a website via Claude on a CMS I haven't tried before. Sanity had been on my list for a while, as it has a great reputation amongst some of the dev teams I worked with at my prior agency. Sanity is a headless CMS, not bloated, and can right-size for a wide range of use cases. The goal was to build a professional portfolio site that could serve as a living document of my work and thinking, without relying on a development agency or a no-code template. The site needed to reflect the same standards I hold client work to: intentional design, clean architecture, and a content model that could scale as the work evolves.
How
Planning began with a detailed specification process, using Claude to pressure-test the content model, information architecture, and technology stack before a single line of code was written. The stack was selected for minimal operational overhead: Next.js with the App Router on the frontend, Sanity for content, Vercel for deployment, and GitHub for version control. Design was prototyped iteratively in React JSX artifacts before handoff to build. The visual language draws from Swiss minimalism, with a warm off-white base, a single red accent, and a typographic pairing of DM Sans and JetBrains Mono. Hero animation was built using Canvas 2D with custom perspective projection, keeping the dependency footprint lean. Claude functioned as both a code generator and a systems thinking partner throughout, helping evaluate tradeoffs and maintain consistency across components as the build progressed.
Results
The site was planned, designed, and deployed without a development agency or third-party template, validating AI-assisted development as a viable production workflow for a senior practitioner without a dedicated engineering background. Sanity performed as expected and is now the preferred CMS recommendation for similarly scoped projects. The build also produced a reusable, documented methodology for AI-assisted web development that is structured and repeatable. The site can be updated via prompt in Claude Code.
My Role
- + Product owner across the full project lifecycle
- +Design lead responsible for all visual and interaction decisions
- +Defined requirements, content model, and information architecture
- +Directed all prototyping and approved decisions before build handoff
- +Managed Claude as a technical collaborator for all engineering execution