2PhatGeeks.com

Where have all the clean themes gone?

Mar 28, 2008 Computers and Internet

Let me start this off by saying that I am truly, truly thankful to you brilliant web designers and CSS gurus out there who can make a word press theme seem as if it were as simple as breathing.

I can tell you how to change link behavior, change the color, put a background behind something and maybe remember how to do hover over’s on a good day, but when it comes right down to it—creating a WordPress theme that works, really works and looks good and is widget supportive and is full of awesome? I got nothing.

I’m a free user. Luckily there are a plethora of people out there that get CSS klutzes and WordPress newbies like myself and make these wonderful themes (such as the one I’m using right now. Hiya Jai!)

So don’t get me wrong when I now complain about the complete and total lack of simple, elegant design.

When I visit a blog and when I am writing my own, I want the eyes drawn to the words. I want people to see the content first. I don’t want them to pay attention to the ads, the blinking banner ads, the rotating giant ‘subscribe to my feeeeeeed or I will eat your SOULLL’…I want them reading what I have to say. I know that whether or not they’ll come back is up to me, but first impressions are hard to repeat. When it comes to a blog design, I want to see words first—glittery slide out, up, sideways and upside down menus later.

So imagine my surprise this morning as I am searching for ‘Simple and Clean,’ ‘Elegant and Simple,’ or just ‘Simple’ WordPress themes, how very little actually came up. Several sites had designs for WordPress releases in the 1’s. A few had a handful of simple layouts that went the extreme of simple (just because it’s black and white doesn’t mean it has to be entirely boring.)

It’s very difficult to find a design that can be attractive, easy on the eye, well done and pretty to look at without detracting the eye from the content. Shame on you, guys. Shame. What ever happened to simple, anyway?

Thank goodness for blogohblog.com, or as you may recognize Jai better—the creator of this very theme we are using right now on 2phatgeeks, Simple-la-Bob. Several of Jai’s themes convey a minimalistic approach with enough care and style to become something wonderful to look at even though there ‘seems’ to be not much. It’s exactly what we like—a customizable header, a neat and clear presentation with writing as the focus and a splash of color mixed in to keep the eye from getting bored. Also perfect to showcase the many pictures I like to take, share or draw.

Imagine my surprise however, in visiting Jai’s site that I notice that not only does Jai offer free templates, but give-a-ways to Premium templates. All you gotta do is blog about it and make sure you leave a track back to be entered.

This weeks design is Trueblogger, and to borrow famous person’s words, croinky, she’s a beaut. Though two columns isn’t something my husband likes it is a sweet damn theme. Jai says that it has:

1. Unique Design & Layout.
2. BBC Style News Ticker.
3. jQuery based scrollable News Section.
4. Separated Comments & Trackbacks.
5. Stylized Comments.
6. Widget Ready.
7. Fully XHTML Compliant.
8. Easily editable CSS file.
9. Web 2.0 Appeal.

So if you’re interested in getting in one some kick-assery in the theme winning department, I recommend you start blogging about it and trackback-ing now! If you’re just in for a really awesome, clean and simple free theme, you can still visit and browse what’s there to grab.

So good luck guys and gals, if you enter—and thanks Jai for making templates that rock my socks without being giant monsters of garish, overdone whosits and whatsitmabobbies which take away from my oh-so-awesome content!

Tags: blog, design