Been on quite the hiatus, however, what better way to get things rolling again than to link to a wonderful list of some of the better, and lesser known WP themes out there. Some have been featured here before, some are new to me. I’m especially fond of Dean Robinsons, Redoable. I must have missed that release with the holidays, and my WP sabbatical.
WordPress Themes
A nice, 3 column theme with heavy emphasis on graphical elements using reds and grays. Also, all .psd files are included for customization.
Circle Six Blogs
For those theme designers out there on a Mac, this Textmate bundle just might push you to make the plunge and purchase Textmate if you haven’t already. This code bundle gives you handy snippets of the most common template tags as well as support for several plugins, including Ultimate Tag Warrior. Quite handy indeed. Now one only needs to do is frame out their XHTML and CSS, then go back in and add relevant tags, much simpler than copying and pasting, or working with a dummy framework and editing the multitude of ids, classes, and spans. While your at the site, you might want to check out their Mac theme development workflow as well.
Still catching up from some of the recent theme releases, and I’d be remiss not to mention this port of an open source design. Though others have attempted to do this for WordPress already, I’d argue to say that this version is the best representation of the design, with attention spent on the comments output to mention just one reason it’s a worth a look if you are looking for a “web 2.0″ style design. It has a definite Hemmingway feel to it. All in all a well done port, and something aspire to in my attempt to port Aqueous.
A very interesting, 3 column theme, with subtle graphic atop each center column post to offset the starkness of the design that somehow works. Lots of white space, with gray text, accented by a dark purple header text, and magenta link colors. No mention if there’s a simple means to customize the header image, but anyone comfortable with an image editing application shouldn’t have a problem doing so. Looks customizable, though it’s widget ready, so most may not feel the need.
First up, this site is completely in Japanese (I think?), so bear with me in sorting out the theme. Regardless of the site’s language, the theme itself appears completely functional for English speaking bloggers. A right hand sidebar with styles in pink, blue, and Christmas included, this theme also supports several plugins and third party services like Ultimate Tag Warrior and Delicious. Worth a look.
If you are looking for a different approach and design to the admin section of your blog, and don’t want to wait to see if Shuttle is ever implemented, try giving Tiger Admin a look. I haven’t looked at the new version yet, but I have tested previous versions and they were well done. I’m comfortable with the default look, but that might be laziness or habit more than anything.
Christmas Gifts Theme for WordPress
One of the better Christmas themes I’ve seen, this two column theme, with a right hand sidebar, uses sharp graphics for a nice overall effect. Worth a look if you are looking to spruce up your blog for the holidays.
Several “wintery”/Christmas themes have been released lately, most however have been simple 2 column themes with a header image sounding the season. Iceburgg brings some modern design elements to it, though I’m not a fan of the blue and white candy cane background. I do like the single column look, with a faux sidebar for each post. The bottom of the page is split into 3 columns, with listing of categories, search, and a customizable “about”. Not a theme for those who like a sidebar with lots of add ons, but if you are looking for a clean theme for the winter season, Iceburgg is worth a look.
Some may have experienced over the last week or two the site appearing down. I think I may have found the problem. I didn’t have the default theme in my content folder, so something was triggering a theme switch, and since no default, no theme, no site. A little reading around the support forums, and I came across the blog post, and though I haven’t checked the logs, I do know I hadn’t followed Alex’s instructions either. So, I’ve uploaded the wp-mobile theme to the proper place, added the default theme to the same directory (though I could have changed the name of my custom design to “default”, thereby forcing WP to load it), and hopefully all is well. Hopefully…