WordPress Theme Building Resources
Monday, September 17th, 2007 8:00 am by
J David 
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Monday, September 17th, 2007 8:00 am by
J David Print this page Share This
Building a WordPress theme is no small task. It takes time, resources and a nearly unlimited amount of patience. I prefer to do my work all at once, but that means I will be sitting at the computer for hour after hour trying to tweak the design. And once you get something you like, you have to open that sucker in different browsers and see how they butcher your theme (of course, the regular nuisances of general web design apply here too). But either way, you will feel accomplished once you do complete the process. Building a WordPress theme, especially if you release it to the public, can be a very gratifying task. Anyhow, let’s begin!
Inspiration For Your Design
- Fresheezy - My newest favorite resource for checking on what other designers are producing.
- Smashing Magazine - These guys are great and always find the best designs.
- Open Web Design - Unlike its counterpart, this site still pumps out fresh amateur designs.
- WordPress Themes - A ton of themes, including those that are sponsored.
- Web Creme - A CSS gallery that gives you the site’s color scheme as well.
- Best Web Gallery - This CSS gallery is maintained by one of my favorite designers.
Tools And Preparation
- How To Install WordPress Locally On Windows - You need to have a local install to build themes.
- Installing WordPress Locally Using MAMP - This tells you how to set up a local install on your Mac.
- Notepad++ - This is my favorite of the Windows text editors.
- Coda - This web development program is the reason I want a Mac.
- Filezilla - The best FTP client available for Windows.
- Cyberduck - An FTP client for Mac OSX.
Tutorials To Build A Theme
- Anatomy of a WordPress Theme - To get you started, you should learn about how a theme is organized.
- How To Create Your Own WordPress Theme - A comprehensive guide to, well, build a theme.
- How to Design a WordPress Theme - A PDF E-book that takes you through all of the steps.
- How to convert any web template into a WordPress theme - This shows you how to take a template you have made or downloaded and convert it to a theme.
- WordPress Theme Guide - A breakdown of Kubrick available online, in a PDF and as a book!
- Wordpress Theme Development Workflow for OSX - The folks at Circle Six Design layout their work flow for theme development in OSX.
- From XHTML/CSS to WordPress - The Undersigned walk you through coding a template into a theme.
- So you want to create WordPress themes huh? - A massive 16 part series on creating a WordPress theme.
- Designing a WordPress Theme From Scratch - The authority on WordPress, Lorelle, gives you her own list of theme creating resources.
Take A Short Cut: Blank Themes
- WordPress Blank Theme V2beta - A good blank theme to get you started!
- WordPress Theme Vorlage - Another useful blank theme with widget support.
- Tomorrows Laundry - Four differently aligned blank themes.
- Sandbox WordPress Theme - Almost forgot about this amazing blank theme. Thanks Lorelle!
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Did I miss it? Did you include the Sandbox WordPress Theme, a fabulous “blank” Theme that is highly customizable and includes Microformats and AtomPub specifications. There are rumors that this may become the new “Default” WordPress Theme or a third Theme that comes with the installation package for WordPress.
Whoops! Thanks for pointing that out, Lorelle! I actually had that in my draft…
Anyhow, I just wanted to say that I am honored to have such an esteemed blogger here! Thanks so much for visiting my wee blog!
good post. david why you didn’t answer me about the advertisement on you website?
All the sites I know are listed. I’d redcommend wpdesigner.com. Webcreme.com seems awesome I just saw that thanks.
Nice WordPress theme building wrap-up J David! It is definitely an undertaking to build your first theme, yet it’s a labor of love to say the least.
Also, I just wanted to recommend Transmit 3 if you’re looking for a kick arse FTP client for OS X, it’s made by Panic - the creators of Coda. Also, check out CSSVista (PC) if you’re a CSS newbie and want to see how CSS works in real time.
BTW J David, are you still on the fence on buying a Mac? Take it from me, you won’t regret it.
Actually, I am about to get a new iMac so I am pumped about that!
Sweet, prepare yourself for 30 second boot ups on the new iMacs.
Be sure to download Quicksilver (quicksilver.blacktree.com), it’s pretty useful and should have been included with OS X by default. Also, check out VMWare’s Fusion if you’re going to run XP on your iMac.
I’m no one special, but thanks. I really like the flexibility of the Sandbox Theme and I’d love to see more people using many of the functions and features within it for developing their WordPress Themes since it sets such a high standard in so many ways.
Great job!
I’d have to say the sandbox theme is picking up some huge momentum. As for the rest of your links, I’ve got a long night of reading ahead of me.
It’s nice to see some other people’s perspectives vs. my own on theme creation.
An excellent list - thanks! What I’m still looking for though is a guide that tells me how to customise WP to make it work like this: http://www.psdtutz.com (built on WP). Any ideas?
[…] you are interested in building your own theme, David also introduced some tools for theme building for […]
excellent list thanks
Perfect one post..
Excellent post with good links, thanks a lot!
good list. thanks a lot
now i can start building my own wordpress theme
This is a great resource if I ever decide to design my own theme. Thanks!
[…] He ahí la importancia de aprender a diseñar para web y optimizar el uso de las herramientas que la generosa comunidad en línea nos convida. Uno de esos recursos es el famoso WordPress, que nos regala libremente su software y nos permite ajustarlo a nuestras necesidades, como nos lo demuestra J David en su artículo “Recursos para construir un tema en WordPress”. […]