Canva MCP — Workspace Assistant (PoC)

A proof-of-concept MCP (Model Context Protocol) server that augments the @canva/cli MCP capabilities with custom workspace-assistant tools for design brief generation and asset staging.

Quickstart

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Build TypeScript
npm run build

# Start the custom MCP server (stdio)
npm start

# Development mode with hot-reload
npm run dev

# Launch the native Canva CLI MCP server
npm run mcp

Connecting to MCP Hosts

Claude Desktop / Cursor / VS Code

Copy mcp-config.json into your MCP client configuration and set the environment variables:

Variable	Description
CANVA_CLIENT_ID	Canva Developer App Client ID
CANVA_CLIENT_SECRET	Canva Developer App Client Secret

For Cursor: Settings → Features → MCP Servers → Add new server, paste the mcpServers block from mcp-config.json.

For Claude Desktop: Edit claude_desktop_config.json and add the mcpServers block.

For VS Code: Use the GitHub Copilot Chat MCP configuration or the VS Code MCP extension.

PoC Checklist

This proof of concept validates:

• [x] MCP Server lifecycle — Stdio server start, tool list, and tool call handling via @modelcontextprotocol/sdk.
• [x] Custom tool: generate_design_brief — Accepts structured input (client name, description, brand colors, deliverables, tone) and returns a formatted Canva Design Kit brief.
• [x] Custom tool: stage_assets — Accepts image URLs and returns a JSON asset manifest that can be consumed by the Canva Assets API.
• [ ] Canva SDK compliance — Verify the manifest output matches Canva's POST /v1/brand-assets expected schema.
• [ ] End-to-end asset sync — Wire the stage_assets manifest to the Canva CLI MCP for actual upload.

Project Structure

canva-mcp/
├── src/
│   └── index.ts          # MCP server entry point, tool registration
├── tools/
│   ├── design-brief.ts    # generate_design_brief tool implementation
│   └── asset-stager.ts    # stage_assets tool implementation
├── package.json
├── tsconfig.json
├── mcp-config.json        # Ready-to-use MCP host configuration
└── .env.example           # Environment variable template

License

MIT