Most AI design tools give you a text box.
Matt Colyer thinks that’s the wrong interface for design.
Colyer, director of product management for developers at Figma, argues that great design requires a diamond-shaped process: First you diverge, generating as many ideas as possible, then you converge around the best ones. Chat is linear, which makes it good for iterating on one design but not good at generating lots of options. Figma’s new on-canvas agent is a first attempt at fixing that.
Dan Shipper talked with Colyer for AI & I about why the text box is the wrong interface for generative design, how Figma’s MCP server is closing the loop between code and design, and why “review” has become the biggest bottleneck in AI-assisted product work.
If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share!
To hear more from Dan Shipper:
Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe
Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper
Timestamps:
1:03 - Introduction
2:15 - Why the SaaSpocalypse narrative has it backwards
5:27 - Matt’s email agent origin story
13:21 - Divergent vs. convergent design thinking
17:39 - Figma’s MCP server
19:45 - Why design agents need personalization
22:09 - Every problem is a context problem
25:12 - Apple and Google as the reigning kings of context
28:18 - Why review is the new bottleneck
Links to resources mentioned in the episode:
Matt Colyer on X: https://x.com/mcolyer
Figma: https://figma.com
Figma MCP server: https://www.figma.com/blog/introducing-figma-mcp-server/