Services / 11 · For Rails teams using Claude, Cursor, Copilot, etc.

Rails teams ship AI-built UI that passes review.

I redesigned the Rails Guides for the Rails Foundation, reviewed by the Rails core team, including DHH. Now I help Rails teams get AI-written views, partials and components through review without a senior engineer squinting at every pixel.

General notes

Rails Guides
Redesign for the Rails Foundation, 2024
Book
Co-author, The Rails View (Pragmatic)
Open source
Author of the ui_guardrails gem
Rails
Shipping since late 2005
Get review relief in a week Or send me one screen, free →

The screen that came back.

An AI-built screen as it came back, next to the same screen after review, on your design system.

Illustration of the same screen after review, using your design system's colors, button component, and spacing scale. Illustration of an AI-built screen as it came back: an invented color block and the wrong button component.

AI-built screen as it came back, compared with the same screen after review, on your design system.

The usual fixes: the wrong button component swapped for yours, an invented color replaced with a token, and off-scale spacing put back on the scale.

Sound familiar?

AI didn't remove the work. It moved it into the review queue.

  • Review overload.

    Every engineer now has an agent opening PRs. Your seniors went from writing code to reading ten times as much of it.

    (Nobody budgeted for that.)

  • Bugs ship as fast as fixes.

    You're moving through the backlog faster and somehow it's bigger.

  • The backlog never shrinks.

    The front-end tickets are the ones that sit there, because nobody wants to own “make it look right.”

  • Design and engineering are arguing about specs.

    The screen technically works. It also forgot seven edge cases and uses a button that isn't in your design system.

Yeah LLMs do cool stuff, but then they randomly inject emoji into your app that has a design system with icons. Naughty Claude.

Put the checking in CI, keep the judgment human.

I wire your repo so the boring part of UI review happens before anyone opens the PR. Your agents get rules that point at your real components, not generic Rails patterns. Your CI flags off-spec markup and visual changes. And a person still signs off on what ships. I don't let an agent approve its own work, and neither should you.

  • Agents that use your components. CLAUDE.md / Cursor rules wired to your actual ViewComponents, partials and Lookbook, so “use the card partial, not a div” stops being a daily comment.
  • A CI gate for UI. The open-source ui_guardrails gem checks templates against your design system. ERB, ViewComponent, the stuff the React-first tools ignore.
  • Visual changes caught before human review, with a human sign-off. Screens get captured and compared on every run, and changes wait for an approval from a real person, so an agent can't approve its own work. This comes from Meticulous's private review tooling, built on top of the open-source ui_guardrails gem and used on client engagements.

ui_guardrails is free and open source on RubyGems. Use it without me. If you'd rather not spend a week tuning it, that's what the entry offer is.

Start small. Keep going only if it's working.

  1. Step 0

    One-Screen Review

    Send me one AI-built screen, I'll send back 3 fixes.

    Free

  2. Step 1

    Review relief in a week

    ui_guardrails and agent rules running in your CI, flagging off-spec AI-built UI before a human reviews it, about a week from kickoff.

    from $2,500

  3. Step 2

    Review-Ready AI Sprint

    The screens and components step 1 flagged, brought onto your design system and gated in CI, shipped as merged PRs by a date in writing. Entry fee credited toward it if you book within 30 days.

    Quoted after step 1

  4. Step 3

    Ongoing review care

    Every month: gate rules and agent docs kept current as your components and the models change, flagged PRs triaged, visual changes reviewed and signed off, and a short monthly keep/kill/change call. Month to month.

    Quoted after step 1

Get off-spec AI UI flagged in CI before anyone reviews it, about a week from kickoff.

  • ui_guardrails installed and tuned to your actual components
  • Agent rules (CLAUDE.md / Cursor rules / AGENTS.md) wired to your real ViewComponents and partials
  • One baseline report: what the gate catches in your app today
  • A 30-minute walkthrough with whoever owns review
  • The full fee credited toward the sprint or ongoing care if you book within 30 days

Not ready to buy anything? Send me one screen.

Send one screen your agent built (screenshot plus the template, or a link to the PR if it's public). I'll send back three specific fixes: what's off-spec, what component it should've used, and what rule would have stopped it. No call, no pitch deck.

Two a week in total, and one per person, ever. Screenshots are fine; I don't need repo access.

Send me a screen

A designer who still writes the code.

  • I redesigned the Rails Guides for the Rails Foundation in 2024. IA, UX, visual design and the front-end build, right in the Rails repo, reviewed by the Rails core team, including DHH. Read the case study
  • ~400 layouts in 3 days. About 200 distinct screens, each redesigned in Paper and built for mobile and desktop. From the file to shipped.
  • I wrote ui_guardrails because I got tired of Claude ignoring my own design systems.
  • Meticulous is a one-person studio that brings in specialists when a project needs them. You get me on every call and every review.

Who this is for

For

Rails teams of roughly 5–60 engineers using AI coding tools, where review is the bottleneck and nobody “owns” the UI. CTOs, heads of engineering, and the senior engineer who's become the de facto design reviewer.

Not for

Teams that want a brand-new design system from scratch (that's Design Systems), or teams not on Rails (start with contact).

Book review relief

Rails version + front-end stackSelect every layer your UI actually uses.
Which AI tools write your UI?
One line is enough.

FAQ

Do we have to use your gem?

No. ui_guardrails is open source and the entry offer is mostly about tuning it to your app, but if you've already got linters and rules that work, I'll build on those.

Do you need access to our repo?

For the paid steps, yes, the same way any reviewer would: a branch and PRs your team merges. For the free screen check, no. A screenshot is plenty.

Is this an AI tool or a person?

A person (me) using AI tools, plus checks that run in your CI. The point is that an agent doesn't get to approve its own work.

We're not on ViewComponent.

Fine. ERB partials, Phlex and Hotwire are all in scope. If you're React-on-Rails, ask and I'll tell you honestly whether it fits.

How fast is “in a week”?

About a week from kickoff for step 1, assuming someone on your side can merge a PR and answer questions. I'll put the date in writing before we start.

What happens after step 1?

Nothing, if you're happy. If you want more, I'll quote the sprint or ongoing care based on what step 1 turned up, and the full fee credits toward it if you book within 30 days.

Is the visual review tool open source too?

No. ui_guardrails is open source. The visual capture and sign-off part is private review tooling I built on top of it and use on client work.

Who actually does the work?

Me. Meticulous is a one-person studio that brings in specialists when a project needs them, and I'm on every review.

What's the catch with the free check?

It's capped at two a week in total, and one per person, ever, so it doesn't eat my calendar. That's the catch.

Run personally by John Athayde, founder of Meticulous.