Up until now on Playground, most templates and generated images were basically flat pictures. You could ask the AI to redo the whole thing with a new prompt, but you couldn't just reach in and change one specific thing, like the headline, or the logo, or that one little element that wasn't doing it for you.
Smart Layers changes that. Every image in Playground is now broken into individual, editable layers that you can select, move, resize, rotate, delete, or rewrite. Stack a few layer edits together, type a prompt, and Playground regenerates your design with all of your changes baked in.
Here's how it works, why we built it, and what it looks like in practice.
Why we built Smart Layers
For a long time, the only way to change an image was to prompt the AI to do it. "Make the headline say Bachelorette." "Move the grapefruit a little to the left." Sometimes it worked.
A lot of the time it'd change the thing you asked about but mess with something else too. The font would shift, the layout would move, you'd end up further from what you wanted than when you started.
We wanted two things at once: the ability to make precise, surgical edits to individual pieces of a template, and the ability to let AI take those edits and run with them. Smart Layers does both.
A real example: Paloma Party to Bachelorette Beach
The best way to explain Smart Layers is to walk through an actual edit. Say you find a "Paloma Party" cocktail template that has the right energy for what you're making, but you need it to be a bachelorette party invite with a tropical feel.
Here's how that goes.
Select a layer. You click the grapefruit garnish on the cocktail glass. The rest of the design dims, and the garnish highlights as its own layer with a small toolbar above it: edit, duplicate, delete. Every visual element in the template works this way. The text, the glass, the decorative sparkles, the background. Each one is its own selectable, editable piece.
Move and rotate it. You grab the grapefruit and drag it to a new position. Pull on the corner handles to resize. Twist the rotation grip to tilt it. The rest of the design stays exactly where it is. This edit gets saved as a step, shown as a small chip at the bottom of the screen so you can see what you've changed so far.
Edit the text. You click the "PALOMA" text layer. It opens up as an editable text field right on the canvas. You clear it and type "Bachelorette" instead. Hit confirm. That edit gets added as another chip next to your first one. The design now shows both changes: the repositioned garnish and the new headline text.
Prompt AI with your edits as context. Now here's the part that makes Smart Layers more than a basic layer editor. At the bottom of the screen, you can see your stacked edits, and there's a prompt field. You type: "Tropical themed with palm trees, beach." Hit send. Playground takes your layer edits and your prompt together, and regenerates the design.
The result. The "Paloma Party" template has become a "Bachelorette Party" invite with a full tropical beach scene: palm tree silhouettes, a sunset sky, sandy shore, the cocktail glass still front and center with the retro typography style preserved. The text reads "Bachelorette Party." The layout keeps the same bones, the same feel, but the context is completely different.
That whole sequence took maybe 30 seconds.
What makes this different
Plenty of tools let you move stuff around on a canvas. Smart Layers is doing something more specific. Each edit you make to a layer becomes an instruction that AI can work with.
Move the garnish, change the headline, type a prompt about a new theme, and the AI doesn't just blindly regenerate from scratch. It takes your specific layer edits as input. It knows you moved the garnish. It knows you changed "Paloma" to "Bachelorette." It reads your prompt about palm trees and a beach. Then it produces something that respects all of those decisions at once.
This is the difference between "regenerate and hope" and "direct the AI with your hands and your words at the same time."
Everything you can do with a layer
Select
Click any element in a template. It highlights with a selection box and handles. A small toolbar appears above it with options to edit, duplicate, or delete. The rest of the canvas dims so you can see exactly what you've grabbed.
Move
Drag any selected layer anywhere on the canvas. Guides appear to help you stay aligned with the rest of the design.
Duplicate
Need another copy of an element? Select it and hit duplicate from the toolbar. Useful when a design needs repeated motifs or when you want to try a variation without losing the original.
Resize
Pull corner handles to scale proportionally. Pull side handles to stretch in one direction.
Rotate
Grab the rotation handle above the selection and twist. Hold shift to snap to clean angles like 45 or 90 degrees.
Delete
Don't need an element? Select it and delete it from the toolbar. The rest of the design stays put. Maybe the template has a decorative graphic that clashes with your brand, or a subtitle you don't want. Just take it out.
Edit text
Double click a text layer and it opens as an editable field right on the canvas. Type your new words. The font, styling, and layout of the original carry over after you send in the edit.
Stacking edits and prompting
This is where Smart Layers really separates itself from a standard layer editor. Every edit you make, whether it's moving a layer, changing text, or deleting an element, shows up as a chip at the bottom of the screen.
So you can make a few specific changes by hand, then describe what you want the whole design to feel like, and the AI puts everything together. Your edits give it the specifics. Your prompt gives it the bigger picture. What comes out reflects both.
You don't have to add a prompt at all if you don't want to. If you're just swapping a name on an invitation, do the swap and you're done. The prompt is there for when you want to take the design somewhere new.
When Smart Layers is the right tool
Smart Layers is built for the work that used to make you start over for no good reason. Swapping a headline or event name. Dropping in your logo or product photo. Repositioning elements that are almost right but not quite. Removing pieces you don't need. Then optionally telling AI to take your changes and shift the whole mood, theme, or setting.
When to start fresh instead
If you don't like anything about the template, not the layout, not the style, not the composition, Smart Layers isn't going to get you there. It's designed for designs where the structure is right and you need to adjust the details, then optionally push the whole thing in a new direction with a prompt. If the bones themselves need to be different, pick a new template or start from a blank canvas.
Tips
Edit the layers first, prompt second. Get your specific changes in place (text, position, deletions) before you write a prompt. This gives the AI more to work with and produces better results than a prompt alone.
Watch your edit chips. The chips at the bottom of the screen are your running list of changes. If something isn't coming out right after a prompt, check what edits are stacked. You might have an old move or deletion in there that's sending things in a direction you didn't intend.
Use templates as starting points. The whole reason Smart Layers exists is that templates are meant to be jumping-off points. Pick one with the right energy, then shape it into exactly what you need. Hunting for a template that already matches every detail is slower than finding one that's close and editing it.
Try it
Open any template in Playground, click on a layer, and start editing. Move something, change the text, delete what you don't need. Then type a prompt and see what comes back. The whole system is built to reward experimenting, and nothing you do is permanent until you want it to be.