Building Custom Themes
With WordPress, not only are you able to choose your own theme and apply a template to your website to design it, but you also can create your own custom theme in three ways:
- You can create your theme from scratch using code.
- You can use a framework, or a template that has foundational code with zero design to add more coding to design the template.
- Or you can use a basic starter theme with basic design structure to reset and add your own design code to.
The best recommended way to design your own custom theme would be option three: to use a basic starter theme because it has the least maintenance to worry about. Building a custom theme using a framework is great also except it requires updating the theme as much as WordPress is updated, and unless you have the ample time to keep up with it, it may not be beneficial. It may be beneficial if it is a personal custom theme that you may use for yourself and are willing to take the time to update it consistently. Lastly, creating a theme from scratch may be the most rewarding types of creating a custom theme, but since it is time consuming it is the most complex version of creating a theme. Personally, for a beginner, I would use a starter theme to create a custom theme and create my own personal theme from scratch when I get better at coding.
When creating a custom theme there are two important files required to create your theme and several other files beneficial but not required and they are:
- Style.css (Required)
- Index.php (Required)
- Archive.php (Optional)
- Functions.php (Optional)
- 404.php (Optional)
- Readme.txt (Optional)
First, you will need to add the Style.CSS file. This is the main document you will use to style up all the features and elements of your website. Secondly, the file “index.php ‘is required and is used as the main landing page for your theme. Any other files that may be used but are optional are files such as “archive.php” which may be used to archive all your blog posts on one page, “404.php” which lands as the error page, “functions.php” which serves as code that functions above code in the theme, and “readme.txt” which serves as a document that shows tips, notes, and instructions on using the theme. Each file adds functionality to the website and serves different elements on a web page separately.
If you have read this far, thank you for reading, and if you liked my post about creating a custom theme, like this post, comment if you have ever created your own custom theme, and share to someone to Gremify their day!