Tag Archive for 'Dusty-Designs.com'

In Praise of the K2 Theme

The most dynamic WordPress theme ever made has been the K2 theme. Based on the blockier, not-as-attractive default Kubrick theme, K2 has consistantly proven itself to be the most customizable theme offered. Throughout the years, I’ve used a lot of WordPress themes, but I always come back to K2.

Since I’m a coder and not a designer, it’s important to me to find WordPress themes that I can customize and edit without putting in too much work. I don’t want to spend more than a day re-working any theme to my liking. I leave the theme making to the designers; I’ll take over the CSS on my own time. This is what makes the WordPress theming community so fun: there are plenty of resources out there for both designers and coders.

Currently, Dusty-Designs is using the three-column version of K2. I like the orange theme. The background comes from Squidfingers with the color scheme based off that image. I used this scheme about a year ago before I took it down, but I’ve always liked it:

Dusty Designs 3-col K2

Dusty Designs 3-col K2

I use a two-column theme at my test blog. I think a 2-column theme best suits a personal blog. A simple content-and-sidebar concoction makes for a simple, easy-to-read site. This is another color scheme from a Squidfingers background. I like this green so much: it’s not distracting, yet it catches your eye at the same time:

Test Blog 3-col K2

Test Blog 3-col K2

My photoblog, Sophisticat, utilizes the single-column option. I believe all photoblogs run with WordPress should be 1-column: the reader’s attention should go immediately to the photograph. All information, like archives, logging in, and links, should be left at the bottom. The background image comes from Scribble Scratch — it’s a nice, cute purple-y scheme that makes me think of bubble gum whenever I go there:

Sophisticat 1-col K2

Sophisticat 1-col K2

WordPress.com blogs also come equipped with the K2 theme — you can customize it, or leave it alone. Either way, have fun with the theme. You’ll see quickly why it’s one of my favorites.

The Future of Dusty Designs

Hi there!

DD is up for renewal in the middle of September. I’m going to renew it and turn it into a design/code repository for myself. I realize I’ve collected up so many excerpts of code that I need a place to put it all. Perhaps this will also spur me into actual design work, too. I’m using WordPress here since I run Movable Type on Blog-Her and Chyrp for Sophisticat. I know I’ve ranted against WordPress so many times before. If Dreamhost did not have the One-Click Install, I’d probably never use it again.

I have not decided if I want to keep the WordPress commenting system or if I want to run Disqus instead. I like Disqus a lot — I use it on my Tumblr for comments and it integrates so easily.

And I really, really like this K2 theme. I used it a few times over the years and it turned out to be the best WordPress theme EVER. So, I’m keeping it.

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