NINETEEN RADICAL DIRECTIONS · an experiment in pushing AI to actually design edition III · --:-- · portland, OR

Nineteen radical
directions. One subject. Zero generic templates.

subject
Marco van Hylckama Vlieg
format
nineteen single-page portfolios · one HTML file each
tools
Claude Code, Gemini, OpenAI Codex & one stubborn designer
frameworks used
zero. hand-set CSS & SVG
thesis
AI can design original work — if you refuse the first answer
§ 001 / the thesis

The default complaint about AI‑assisted design is that it produces generic, vibe‑coded, Tailwind‑flavoured slop. That’s true — if you ask for one shot and accept it.

This page collects nineteen radically different one-page portfolio designs for the same subject. They were made by asking AI tools to produce genuinely original, non‑conventional work — and refusing every answer that read as derivative.

Each one is hand‑set in a single HTML file. No frameworks, no component libraries, no design system. Just CSS, SVG, vanilla JavaScript, and a real opinion behind every typographic choice.

The point isn’t that AI replaces a designer. The point is that good design taste — refusing the obvious answer, naming what feels generic, knowing when to push for the weirder option — turns a tool that produces template output into one that produces work worth looking at.

finding 01

The first answer is always the average answer.

Every initial output landed near the median portfolio aesthetic. The good work only began when that draft was rejected outright.

finding 02

Specificity unlocks originality.

“Make it cool” returns mush. “A working terminal where commands actually run” or “a postmarked envelope” returns design.

finding 03

Iteration is the actual craft.

Every page was revised six to twelve times — text overflow, alignment bugs, gimmicks that didn’t work. Hand‑tuning is still the job.

§ 003 / what was said

The kind of feedback that produced the work.

The default AI output got rejected, hard, every single time. Here are the actual things said in the room — by the human, not the model.

on the first attempt

Also, this entire design is still rather reminiscent of my website. Can you not make it more original?

on a half-baked effect

The effect with the dots in the hero is cool but doesn’t work right. It doesn’t show where the cursor is and initially it doesn’t load right at all.

on a gimmick

Click and drag rotates the entire module. The record looks weird.

pushing for more

Now do one more. Yet another completely wild, different direction.

naming the bar

Make it NOT look like the average vibe-coded website. We need this to be amazing and different.

after the observatory

This is so insanely cool I want you to do another one.

§ 004 / about the subject

These pages all describe the same person — Marco van Hylckama Vlieg, senior product designer and AI‑native builder, twenty years across Google, Yahoo!, Walmart Labs, Kohl’s, and Endemol, plus an independent product lab.

The nineteen designs aren’t directly competing with each other. They’re a deliberate range — print, code, mail, music, science, infographic, mystical, blueprint, curator, console, newspaper, telemetry, desktop, atlas, evidence room, tasting menu, exchange, conservatory, title sequence — showing that how a portfolio is framed can change what it actually communicates.

contact the subject
marcovhv@gmail.com
the lab
ai-created.com
professional
linkedin.com/in/marcovhv
also
x.com/AIandDesign
@AIandDesign on youtube