WordPress 4.4 is the last scheduled major release of the year and with it will come a new default theme to replace Twenty Fifteen. On the Make WordPress Core site, Tammie Lister published an image gallery that shows off the design of Twenty Sixteen.
According to Lister, the process of determining the new default theme has taken months, “Lots of themes were considered, eventually settling on the one you see below. It’s a perfect fit,” she said.

Twenty Sixteen is designed by Takashi Irie, who also designed the Twenty Fourteen and Twenty Fifteen default themes. Irie describes Twenty Sixteen as:
A modernized approach of an ever-popular layout — a horizontal masthead and an optional right sidebar that works well with both blogs and websites. It has custom color options that allow you to make your own Twenty Sixteen. The theme was designed on a harmonious fluid grid with a mobile first approach. This means it looks great on any device.
The new theme has hints of Twenty Fourteen but is different enough to stand on its own as a unique design. It doesn’t look as modern as Twenty Fifteen out-of-the box but the design could change during the 4.4 development cycle.
If you want to help Twenty Sixteen be the best it can be, please join the weekly meetings held every Monday and Friday at 16:00 UTC in the #core-themes channel on SlackHQ. The meetings are a half hour-long and start once the theme is initially added to WordPress core.
What do you think of Twenty Sixteen?
It kills me that so much effort is put into default WordPress themes rather than putting effort where collectively so much more value could be created.