Step Two: Choosing a WordPress Theme

A WordPress theme is a template of sorts that contains design elements and other code that determines the look and feel of your WordPress site. For a much more detailed explanation of WordPress themes, go to the WordPress Codex. My purpose, here, is to empower you, not to bog you down with a lot of technical information.

Before choosing a theme, keep in mind that we can customize all of the colors, and change out any of the images - we can also resize or eliminate images, and rearrange or remove any of the elements, like categories, archives, calendars, links, etc.. In addition, we can replace the sidebar elements with any other elements we want, where we want them. The only thing that will not change is the content or “blogging” area itself; however, we can customize things like images designed into the entries, how the dates are displayed, etc.. This will all make a lot more sense when you see how we customized Kelley’s theme from the one she chose - chances are, you will not even recognize it.

You want to look for a theme that has the general “look and feel” that you want, including amount of white space, number of columns, menu structure (pages), etc. The only absolute requirement I have when setting up a site is that it is “Widget Ready.”

Now, go to the WordPress Theme Viewer.

Notice on the left, you can choose filters/sorting options - check the box that says “Widget Ready” and any others you want and pull down the “Any or All” drop down so it says “All.”

When your choices come up, you can click on “Test Run” to see how the theme looks in action, keeping in mind that you can customizing it greatly to fit your needs. Think about how your logo would fit in with the theme, how your other graphic elements might integrate, and where you would want place to place sidebar elements to get a feel for whether it is a good fit for you. If you are doing this on your own, though, and don’t want to bother doing any customization, you could just as easily find a theme to suit you.

Things to consider when choosing a theme:

Widget Ready themes.

Like I discuss in Anatomy of a WordPress Site, widgets are snippets of code that are easily dropped into your sidebar. But if your theme does not support them, you won’t be able to use them.

Fixed vs. Fluid width themes.

If you change the size of your browser window right now, you will notice that the text and other elements of the site change along with the size of the window - that is because I chose a “Fluid” theme for this site. Fixed width themes will get cut-off (usually at the right) if the browser window is smaller than the width of the theme. This is not usually a problem if you don’t plan to have more than 2 columns, or don’t plan to say a whole lot, or have a lot of sidebar elements.

Number of Columns.

You can have from one to four columns - one of them is always the content or “blogging” area. If you are not sure how many columns you will eventually want, it is a good idea to go ahead and choose a theme with 3 columns just in case.

Navigation

If you are going to use WordPress to “power” your site, you will want to make sure your theme has a navigation menu where visitors are used to seeing one - like at the top or to the left. Many of the themes don’t have them because they are designed as true blogs, and not as full Website templates. Sometimes, a theme is just too perfect for my needs, so I build a menu into it if it does not have one.

A caveat: Not all themes are created equal!

It is always a good idea to choose several themes you like, because coding standards are not really set for them. As a result, there is no guarantee that a theme will not have bugs in it.

If you can’t find a free theme.

Click on the flashing link on the left to go to Template Monster. There you will find WordPress themes for around $55.00. I recommend them because I have used their themes, and the code has always been clean. Again, be sure the theme is Widget Ready - they call it “widgetized,” and you will be able to tell whether it is or not under the themes specs when you click on it.

So, after all of that, here are the two FREE themes Kelley chose:

Let’s have some fun customizing the final choice…