Claude Project Setup

Claude Project Setup

A template system for spinning up project folders that work seamlessly across Claude.ai chats, [Cowork](https://www.cowork.ai/) on the desktop, and Claude Code in the terminal. Drop a new project into a folder and every Claude surface the user works in will already know it — the goal, the decisions, the voice, what the last session worked on.

Quickstart

git clone git@github.com:16wells/claude-project-setup.git
cd claude-project-setup
bash bin/setup.sh

The setup script is interactive (just press Enter to accept the defaults). It writes a gitignored `config.local.md`, creates your `CLIENTS_ROOT` / `INTERNAL_ROOT` / `TOOLS_ROOT` directories, and installs the user-level `/project-setup` slash command at `~/.claude/commands/project-setup.md`. Re-running is safe — it detects an existing config and asks before overwriting.

Then in Claude Code run `/project-setup` from anywhere. Full setup details and the manual path are below.

The Problem This Solves

Working across multiple Claude surfaces is a context nightmare. Every browser chat starts blank. Every Claude Code session starts blank. Every Cowork window starts blank. You end up re-explaining the same project five times a week.

This repo is a set of folder templates plus a small handful of slash commands that fix that. Everything lives on disk, every Claude surface reads the same files, and the iterative-memory discipline (update `state.md` as work happens, append to `activity-log.md`, log decisions, drop observations in `insights.md`) is documented in every project's `CLAUDE.md`.

The Three Templates

The repo ships three templates because not every project is a client engagement. The right template depends on **who owns the success bar** and **whether there's a buyer being designed for.**

Template	When to use	Charter file	Optional context file
client-project/	Engagement delivered to an external client. The client owns success crite