Finding and Installing WordPress Themes: New Look for Langwitches
by Langwitches ~ July 15th, 2009. Filed under: Web Desgin.
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Inspired by writing the previous post “WordPress blog and your own domain“, I started playing with new WordPress themes.
Thousands of WordPress themes are available on the web. You can download many of them free as well as for a fee.
- You can google “WordPress themes”
- Search WordPress’ Free Themes Directory
- Browse some of the links in my del.icio.us bookmarks for interesting WordPress themes.
- Check out Steve Dembo’s Top 20 WordPress Themes for Education
After two years of using the Ad Clerum theme…
Langwitches Blog Look 2007-2009
I decided it was time for a new look for Langwitches…
In WordPress version 2.8, there is the option to “Add New Themes” directly in the Dashboard under “Appearance”.
There you can search for a theme by certain criteria, such as colors, columns, width and other features. But you can also upload a zip file, that you have previously downloaded from another theme site.
Once you have found a theme that you like. Find the download button/link, then save the file to your computer (I created a dedicated WP-themes folder under MyDocuments).
Once the zip file of the theme is saved on your computer, you can
- unzip your file, then upload via FTP to your WP-content> themes folder on your server OR
- return to the Dashboard > Appearance>and click on upload, then browse for the folder that contain your zip files of the theme and click “Install Now”.
Once the theme has been installed, click on “Themes” under Appearance. The top thumbnail shows you the theme that is currently active. Select “Preview” or “Activate” link of any of the other theme thumbnails to change the look of your blog.
The free WordPress themes at Refueled.net, seem to speak to me the most, so I found another one, Peacemaker, that I liked. I was able to tweak it a little bit to customize Langwitches’ look by changing the header and adding widgets to the two available sidebars.
With this particular theme, changing the header was simple. Not all themes will have the option for a Custom Header under the “Appearance” menu. In this case, I simply had to create an image (970 x 160 pixels), save it on my computer, then browse and upload it. This automatically changed the header from the default one to my customized one.
In case your new theme does not have the option, you will need to upload your new image via FTP into the WP-content>themes> “your-themes-name”>images folder in order to replace the default header image. Make sure that you keep the SAME dimensions as well as the SAME image file name as the default one.
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