CritiqueCrew: Orchestrating Multi-Perspective Conversational Design Critique

2026-02-02

AI Summary

This work addresses the high cognitive load and cross-functional friction UI designers face when balancing user needs, business objectives, and engineering constraints. Existing automation tools offer only static lists of issues without actionable remediation pathways. To bridge this gap, the authors introduce CritiqueCrew, a Figma plugin that pioneers a structured multi-expert collaboration framework—embodying distinct roles of UX designer, product manager, and engineer—to deliver context-aware, conversational critiques. By transforming abstract feedback into interactive, solution-oriented suggestions, CritiqueCrew repositions AI from a passive “issue auditor” to an active “co-creator” of design solutions. In two studies involving 48 participants, CritiqueCrew significantly outperformed conventional static inspection tools in improving design quality, subjective user experience, and designers’ trust in the creative process.

Technology Category

• Humans and AI: Intelligent User Interfaces
• Cognitive Modeling & Cognitive Systems: Computational Creativity
• Constraint Satisfaction and Optimization: Solvers and Tools

Application Category

• Responsible Web: Human-perceived consequences of algorithmic deployment on the web
• Economics, Online Markets and Human Computation: LLM based quality controls for crowd work
• User Modeling, Personalization and Recommendation: Fairness-aware retrieval and ranking

Abstract

UI designers face growing cognitive load and cross functional friction at the intersection of user needs, business goals, and engineering constraints. Existing automated tools often deliver static"problem lists", lacking actionable repair paths and disrupting creative flow. We introduce CritiqueCrew, a Figma tool that supports designers through conversational critique. CritiqueCrew generates multi-faceted insights by implementing a multi-perspective orchestration of distinct expert roles (UX, PM, Engineer). It translates abstract critiques into concrete actions via in context feedback and interactive remediation. Across two independent controlled studies (Total N=48), CritiqueCrew significantly improved both design quality and subjective experience compared to a traditional static checker. Furthermore, our results confirm that the structured orchestration of expert roles-rather than a unified model-is key to fostering trust and creativity support. Our work demonstrates how AI can shift from a"problem auditor"to a"solution co-creator"by integrating multi-perspective dialogue with interactive repair, offering design implications for future creative tools.

Problem

• cognitive load
• cross-functional friction
• static critique
• design creativity
• UI design

Innovation

• multi-perspective orchestration
• conversational critique
• interactive remediation
• design co-creation
• expert role simulation