Category: Design

  • Style groups of blocks in one click with colorways

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    Updated Dec 7, 2022
    Style groups of blocks in one click with colorways

    Consistency. That’s the name of the game when it comes to designing a website. And having a way to design, and apply, like-styling to whole sets of blocks is a huge step towards publishing pages with consistency and speed. So I explored an idea I’m calling Colorways — a “simple mode” for stylizing page content.

  • Exploring WordPress as a design tool

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    Updated Dec 5, 2022
    Exploring WordPress as a design tool

    Last week I challenged myself to take one pattern, from one theme, and morph it multiple times — only using the design controls block editor. It’s kind of like CSS Zen Garden, but without CSS — just out-of-the-box WordPress block design tooling.  One theme. One pattern. Seven ways. No additional blocks, nor custom CSS between scenes — just designing […]

  • How to add Fluid Typography to WordPress Block Themes

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    Updated Nov 9, 2022
    How to add Fluid Typography to WordPress Block Themes

    Last year I shared a piece on fluid typography, in particular on adopting a fluid type scale within WordPress block themes, using the CSS clamp() function. The method I experimented with is interesting in that it uses a type scale, then calculates the fluid type values for each font size within the theme’s theme.json file. While a bit […]

  • Using a Fluid Type Scale in WordPress Block Themes with Theme.json

    I’m a big fan of the CSS clamp() function and how it allows for behavior previously only possible with media queries. The clamp() function takes three parameters: a minimum value, a preferred value, and a maximum allowed value — resulting in a value between each of those. And while clamp() may be used in a […]

  • A new look for the Login Designer website

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    Updated Feb 18, 2022
    A new look for the Login Designer website

    I never actually launched an “official” website for Login Designer, a plugin I built to help folks better customize their WordPress login pages. The plugin’s aging landing page clearly needed some attention. And now that Login Designer is my only active side project – I gave it just that.

  • CoBlocks has a new logo

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    Updated Feb 18, 2022
    CoBlocks has a new logo

    A couple of weeks ago, I started pushing out a new, cleaner logo for CoBlocks. We ultimately needed a new logo that accurately portrayed the underlining theme behind our work, and that fit nicely within the context of the new Gutenberg WordPress block editor.

  • Block Gallery, Winner at the Automattic Design Awards

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    Updated Feb 18, 2022
    Block Gallery, Winner at the Automattic Design Awards

    Block Gallery, my Gutenberg block project for building beautiful galleries with WordPress 5.0, was announced as this year’s winner in the Best Solution category of the Automattic Design Awards.

  • 10 Practical Tips to Building Quality WordPress Themes

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    Updated Feb 18, 2022
    10 Practical Tips to Building Quality WordPress Themes

    Intro A few weeks ago, I published a guide on three key principles to designing functional WordPress themes. This week’s article stays on the topic of WordPress theme design but leans towards actionable tips and techniques to building quality WordPress themes.

  • Designing Highly Functional WordPress Themes

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    Updated Feb 18, 2022
    Designing Highly Functional WordPress Themes

    Designing WordPress themes Designing beautiful and highly functional WordPress themes is not as simple as opening your design editor of choice and going to town. There’s a lot more to think about when it comes to developing beautiful WordPress themes that intentionally focus on both form and function.