AlpacaLabsLLC/skills-for-architects

Contents
- How it works
- Two editions
- Commercial services
- Install
- The basic workflow
- What's inside
- Make it yours
- Philosophy
- When something goes wrong
- Updating and what's new
- Contributing
- Data, privacy and telemetry
- License
How it works
Before a studio can trust AI with real work, it has to make a few decisions. Arch Studio gives each one a place to live and keeps the assistant inside it.
- **Governance: who approves what.** Adopt your own AI-use policy or start from the default one. The assistant works within it. It shows a work plan before larger jobs, offers findings to your records instead of writing them on its own, and marks building-code, zoning and specification output for professional review. The architect still signs off.
- **Practice areas: where AI helps.** Skills are grouped by practice area, from due diligence and programming to specifications and FF&E. Use the areas that fit your practice and ignore the rest.
- **Memory: what the studio remembers.** Studio settings, project facts, decisions, documents, tasks and time live in plain files in folders you own, so the next session can pick up where the last one ended.
- **Tooling: what the assistant can use.** Start with the 61 bundled skills as working references. Then write your own with /as:skill-maker. Your skills live in your studio or project folder, and plugin updates never overwrite them.
Run /as:studio to set up the governance and memory side: your AI-use policy, naming and filing rules, units, jurisdiction and project phases. It shows exactly what it will create and writes nothing until you approve. Then register projects. From there, Norma, the coordinator, sends each request to the right skills within the rules you set. You can also skip setup and try a skill on a single task first.
Two editions
- **Arch Studio OSS** (this repository) is the single-user setup. You install the plugin in your own Claude Code or Codex, and your studio and project records stay in local folders. It is free and MIT-licensed.
- **Arch Studio MCP** is the hosted service, for teams. It delivers the same Arch Studio content to a connected assistant through a signed-in firm account. It also adds hosted modules, such as the Materials Library, whose records only members of that firm can reach. It sends instructions; your assistant still does the work with its own tools, and the service cannot reach your local files. Project records stay local in both editions. Only records you save to a hosted module are held by the service (data governance).
Use one or the other, not both. To ask about Arch Studio MCP, email hello@alpa.llc.
Commercial services
Arch Studio OSS is open source under the MIT license. If your studio wants help working through these decisions, writing its own skills, moving a team to Arch Studio MCP, training, or support, email ALPA at hello@alpa.llc.
Install
One plugin, as (Arch Studio), with the same skills on every host. Install it in each assistant you use.
Claude Code
Codex
Claude Desktop
Open **Customize → Plugins → + → Add marketplace**, choose a repository source, enter AlpacaLabsLLC/skills-for-architects, and install **Arch Studio**. Workspace, hook, and subagent behavior depends on the Claude surface and permissions your organization enables; the workflow below is tested with Claude Code.
Check that it works
Type /as:studio in Claude Code, or $studio in Codex. It offers four paths: set up a studio, use the skills without setup, open an existing studio, or learn on a fictional practice project. Nothing is created (no studio, project, ALPA account, cloud store, or git repository) until you approve an exact local folder. Using the skills without setup creates no workspace files; a skill creates only the output you ask for.
New to AI assistants? Start the six-module course with /as:learn (Codex: $learn).
For teams, Arch Studio MCP is connected rather than installed; see Two editions. Install the plugin or connect the MCP, not both: the MCP delivers instructions only, does not run skills, and cannot reach your local files. See release delivery.
The basic workflow
1. **studio** — Run /as:studio to record your studio's policy, conventions and projects, or skip setup and go straight to a task. Skills work either way.