The new block-based navigation screen is once again delayed after it was originally slated for WordPress 5.5 and then put on deck for 5.6. Contributors have confirmed that it will not be landing in WordPress core until 2021 at the earliest. “The Navigation screen is still in experimental state in the Gutenberg plugin, so it hasn’t had…
Gutenberg 9.1 made a backward-incompatible change to its theme.json file (experimental-theme.json while full-site editing is under the experimental flag). This is the configuration file that theme developers will need to create as part of their block-based themes. Staying up to date with such changes can be a challenge for theme authors, but Ari Stathopoulos, a…
Fashion is ephemeral. Art is eternal. Indeed what is a fashion really? A fashion is merely a form of ugliness so absolutely unbearable that we have to alter it every six months! Thus wrote Oscar Wilde on Victorian-era fashion in an article titled “The Philosophy of Dress” for the New-York Tribune in 1885. In many…
In August, following the suspension of the popular Astra theme, WordPress Meta contributors opened a ticket to add a new “delisting” status for non-compliant themes. Astra’s infraction, breaking the directory’s ban on affiliate links, put more than a million users at risk of not getting theme updates just as WordPress 5.5 was on deck for…
On August 26, Automattic launched a new theme titled Seedlet that focused on integrating with the WordPress block editor. A few days later, it was also live in the WordPress.org theme directory. The theme development team wanted to produce a theme that would be in a good position to transition to full-site editing later this…
MotoPress, a theme and plugin shop in operation since 2013, has acquired the Gutenix WordPress theme and its commercial ZeGuten blocks plugin for Gutenberg. The free theme currently has more than 700 active installs after nine months on WordPress.org. MotoPress already has a number of successful niche WordPress themes and plugins but Gutenix fills the…
A couple of years ago, Morten Rand-Hendriksen launched WP Rig for WordPress. The goal was to bring a modern starter theme and build process to the theme development community. Now, he and the current team are hoping to find someone new to keep the project moving. Whoever is chosen will gain outright ownership of the…
For months, I have eagerly awaited the official release of WordPress 5.5, an update that promised to put the long-awaited block patterns system into the hands of theme designers. I may sound like a broken record at this point, but patterns have the potential to revolutionize WordPress theme development, even more so than the upcoming…
The Themes Team suspended Astra from the official theme directory just a few short weeks after it became the first non-default WordPress theme to surpass one million active installs. The reason: the theme was breaking the directory’s ban on affiliate links. The theme has since been reinstated. However, it has been delisted from the popular…
“Do you ever read the subtitles on a video so you didn’t need to unmute it?” asked William Patton, a representative from the WordPress Themes Team. “Used the ‘beep’ from a crosswalk to know when to cross the road? Found yourself reading the info panel at an airport? Those things are considered features, but in…
WordPress has almost always provided a top-level admin menu item for themes. It is clearly labeled “Appearance.” It is the single location that all WordPress users know to visit to modify any appearance-related things for their WordPress site. However, there is a movement within the Themes Team to allow themes to place an additional top-level…
On Tuesday, Brainstorm Force announced its Astra theme passed 1 million active installations. It is the only non-default theme in the official WordPress theme directory to reach such a height. Popularity breeds popularity. Once the theme broke 50,000 installs in January 2019, it was a quick hop and skip to 500,000 in October and 1…
Blocksy is one of the best free themes available for the block editor right now and is rapidly growing in popularity. CreativeThemes, the Romania-based company behind the theme, released an update to Blocksy this week, along with a new starter site for charities. The concept of “starter sites” is an interesting new twist on “starter…
Blossom Themes launched Sarada Lite, its 25th theme, on the WordPress theme directory today. The theme is billed as a “feminine blog theme” specifically for professional bloggers. However, it would work well in a variety of contexts. While it is targeted at fashion, travel, and lifestyle bloggers, it is well-rounded enough for anyone who wants…
Ariele Lite, the latest theme from Rough Pixels, went live in the WordPress theme directory today. In an ecosystem where designers are dubbing most themes as multipurpose, it is refreshing to see a well-designed theme that is unafraid to cater specifically to bloggers. It is not often that I get the opportunity to test a…