I installed the Thesis theme on November 6, 2008.
WordPress was new to me that year, having migrated from Google’s Blogspot system a month earlier; and I wanted to display certain features on my blog. I didn’t want to spend countless hours learning CSS and PHP programming to do it on my own so it made fiscal sense to pay for a what you see is what you get premium theme.
Thesis (and the user community forums) saved me headaches.
The first two years were a godsend. But since mid-2011 I saw myself using less thematic features and creating more customized functions. These functions could as easily be manually coded into any WordPress editor. With my social networking priorities changing this year, I secretly wanted to get rid of Thesis but I didn’t know what other theme to replace it with. I knew I wanted a theme. I just wanted something simpler.
An hour before writing this sentence on the evening of January 22, 2013, I replaced Thesis with a minimalist theme authored by Leo Babauta.
Leo is the blogger of Zen Habits.
He is calling the theme zh2.
Here is a screenshot with Thesis:
Here is a screenshot with zh2:
Regular visitors will instantly notice changes, such as removal of the sidebar and navigational links from the header.
They are now in the footer.
I am slowly tweaking behind-the-scenes code to bring back some elements that should be here but are not, such as customizing the 404 error page and displaying guest author bylines. I also want to tighten the header with better font colors and possibly bring back social sharing buttons for each post.
For now, I am savoring the change.
About Ari Herzog
Hey Ari – your site looks great. I had a similar change on both my own blog and my dog’s blog sadieshihtzu.com. I’ve installed one-column themes on both to be more compatible with tablets.
I was really disappointed with the most recent release of Thesis because it was SO different and, try as I might, I couldn’t get a handle on it.
I’ve been using Thesis for the past couple of years on Sadie’s blog and it was a big deal to remove it but, like you, I wanted something simpler.
I realise I could have used Thesis to create a one-column theme but the learning curve with the new version just wasn’t worth it to me.
Wow, I was looking at an older blog post last night when I wrote about blog design and saw your comment there — so it is surreal to see you here too. I just clicked over to your blog, hadn’t been there in a while but you will see I’ve since added some comments so you’re now (once again) on my radar.
I’ve been a Thesis person for years but like Liz decided the latest version was so different that I couldn’t be doing with going through a learning curve to master it. I ended up leaving my websites with the old version of Thesis which I’m not too happy about. I guess I hope that Thesis will go back to the way it was.
I never upgraded to the 2.0 version. But thanks for chiming in with your thoughts about Thesis.
Since I am not really creative nor do I have any knowledge in programming, I dare say this is above my know How! Still thing is I love reading up on it. It doesn’t hurt to have ideas about this. I have a WordPress Self hosted site and its a daily struggle to get things the way I want them in my head. Still I hope to learn..
I loved reading your article!
It’s not hard. From your WordPress dashboard, there are prompts to install and activate new themes. You then can use the default or copy/paste from other places different php/css to use.
Thesis is great, but I don’t think it is the end-all-be-all theme. I like your design, different can be good. In the end, content is what keeps people coming back.
Agreed on content. Very important.
I really like the new look. It’s clean and uncluttered.
But almost immediately you can tell that this is a personal blog and not a business blog. I’m not sure what feel you’re going for but make sure that the feel of the blog matches your end goals
This is very much a personal blog — geared for business readers.
Uh oh.
Is this starting to be a trend?
I have seen this with another one of my fav blogs.
How come you didn’t choose another “platform” like genesis?
PS
Love the new design though.
much more clean fast sharp and professional upgrade all around
Which other blog did you see a similar shift? And, I purposefully didn’t want a premium theme. I didn’t want the so-called bells and whistles. I wanted white space. I wanted you to read my words. I wanted simplicity.
The new design looks awesome I love a simple feeling to a website of blog.
_________________________________
Timothy Cocores
Digital Marketing
http://www.heybubble.com Live Chat Software
Thanks for your thoughts Timothy.
I like the look but are you sure that it is going to work out with the same.?
It’s working so far…
Hi Ari, I have been really busy of late, hence the late reply. My apologies.
I liked the old theme. I like the new theme. Different bits of me like different bits of each theme.
Part of me says the new one is far too empty, too white, too subtle; but another part of me likes that subtlety
WordPress Vanilla commenting system is very welcomed by me!
Replies are an issue for me. They are no longer nested, and all comments are in chronological order – is there any way you can fix this?
I like the simplicity, and think it shows you are right up to date with the times.
Also a splash of colour wouldn’t go a miss don’t you think? Grey and white doesn’t (to me) represent new and emerging social media – clean and tidy yes, but not grey.
Regarding code, I am no genius, but am slowly getting better, so if you ever need any help, just email me – no promises, but I might be able to try
Congrats on taking the leap!
Christopher
If not grey then what color?
And, nested replies is something I’m investigating. It’s set for that in my WP settings but something in the theme is overriding that.
Have comments always been in a grey box, or have you just added that feature? Was I just really unobservant the last time?
Maybe when you mouse over links you could get a refreshing splash of colour. Just a thought
Comment boxes used to be white and the author was (and still is) blue.
Its a welcomed shade of grey
I killed the grey. It’s now a “moccasin” color: hex code FFE4B5.
Colour!!!!!!!!!