Workplace Programmer

What it does

Type /workplace-programmer in Claude Code and describe your project. The skill turns Claude into a senior workplace strategy consultant that builds a complete office space program through conversation — no spreadsheets, no templates.

Every recommendation is synthesized from benchmarking data, industry research, and the specifics of your project.

Install

Claude Desktop:

1. Open Customize → Browse plugins
2. Click + → Add marketplace from GitHub
3. Enter AlpacaLabsLLC/skills-for-architects
4. Install the Programming plugin

Claude Code (terminal):

claude install github:AlpacaLabsLLC/skills-for-architects/03-programming

Usage

/workplace-programmer 30,000 RSF tech company, 200 people, 3 days hybrid

Or start with no context and let discovery guide the conversation:

/workplace-programmer

The skill works through four phases:

• Discover — Learns about your organization while sharing relevant research
• Synthesize — Generates custom area splits across five zones
• Detail — Proposes seat types, room schedules, and support spaces
• Refine — Handles adjustments with explicit tradeoff analysis

Demo: Creative Agency — 10,000 RSF

Real output from a session. The brief: “10K RSF creative agency in NYC, 100 headcount, ~50 peak occupancy, no private offices, heavy pin-up/crit wall needs, client-facing.”

The skill recommended 26% work (low, because only 50 people peak out of 100 hybrid headcount) and 24% meeting (high, to support client presentations and enclosed crit rooms):

Zone	%	SF
Work	26%	2,600
Meeting	24%	2,400
Common	17%	1,700
Circulation	27%	2,700
BOH	6%	600
Total	100%	10,000

43 seats (30 assigned height-adj desks + 13 hot desks) at a 0.86:1 seat-to-peak ratio. 22 rooms including 2 dedicated crit/project rooms with pin-up walls and 8 phone booths for hybrid video calls.

Demo: Law Firm — 20,000 RSF

Brief: “Maximize attorney headcount, 1 private office per 10 attorneys, 1 support per 10, 5 days in office.”

The skill pushed work to 41% and landed at 111 attorneys + 11 support = 122 headcount at 164 SF/seat:

Zone	%	SF
Work	41%	8,200
Meeting	17%	3,400
Common	7%	1,400
Circulation	27%	5,400
BOH	8%	1,600
Total	100%	20,000

30 rooms including a boardroom for depositions, 10 phone booths (1:10 ratio for attorney calls), and 2 file rooms sized for a digital-first firm.

Every recommendation cites research (JLL, Gensler, VergeSense, etc.) and names the tradeoff. Programs export to program.json, .md, and .csv.

What’s included

• 10 archetypes — Dense Open Office (65 SF/seat) through Creative Agency (233 SF/seat), including 2 built from real programs
• 22 space types — Desks, conference rooms, phone booths, support spaces with default SF and capacity
• 43 research findings — From JLL, CBRE, Gensler, VergeSense, Density, Leesman, Steelcase, Hassell (including 6 years of Workplace Futures Survey 2020–2025), and peer-reviewed studies

Customization

Everything the skill knows lives in editable JSON — no code to change.

Add space types

Your firm uses focus pods, wellness rooms, or lab benches that don’t exist in the defaults? Add them to data/space-types.json with an ID, category, default SF, capacity, and optional utilization ratio. The skill immediately uses them in room schedules.

{
  "id": "focus-pod-2p",
  "name": "Focus Pod (2p)",
  "category": "meeting",
  "default_sf": 120,
  "capacity": 2,
  "utilization_rsf": 1500
}

Add archetypes

Run a program you like? Save its area splits as a new archetype in data/archetypes.json. The skill references archetypes as benchmarks during synthesis — it won’t apply them as templates, but it will cite them when explaining where your program sits relative to norms.

{
  "id": "healthcare-clinic",
  "name": "Healthcare Clinic",
  "sf_per_seat": 200,
  "area_splits": { "work": 25, "meeting": 22, "common": 8, "circulation": 27, "boh": 18 },
  "private_office_pct": 40
}

Add research

Drop findings into data/findings.json with source, year, and topic tags (hybrid, density, meeting-rooms, focus, acoustics, amenity-roi, abw). The skill cites them during discovery and synthesis.

Change the domain

Edit SKILL.md to swap the persona entirely — “senior workplace strategist” becomes “lab planning specialist” or “retail space planner.” The conversation flow adapts to whatever domain knowledge you write in.