Finding the right theme for an academic portfolio site

  • Unknown's avatar
    alexbowyer · Member ·

    Hi, I’m just looking at setting up a new & simple academic portfolio site on wordpress.com (I’ve previously gone for self-hosted WordPress sites in the past). I’m an experienced WordPress developer but am now happy to sacrifice CSS layout flexibility and take a “good enough” site for the tradeoff of zero maintenance effort required (compared to running wordpress.org myself and maintaining it).

    However, I am struggling to find a wordpress.com theme that meets my needs. Surprisingly there seem to be no academic themes available on wordpress.com theme library.

    All i really need is:
    – A photo/bio somewhere prominent on main page (top box or sidebar)
    – An immediately visible menu (Publications, Presentations, Blog, Contact…)
    – Neat, simple, clean list of posts with synopses and featured photo.

    One theme I have found that might do is Hexa. My question is, is there any way to make the menu with this theme on-by-default? I am concerned visitors won’t discover it / won’t click the hamburger?

    I’m also considering Sapor. Is there any way with that one to have a picture (gravatar image, say), appear top left, above the menu, where there is a dead white space, instead of below the menu?

    I’m also considering Libre 2. But I don’t like the cursive/italicized script. Is there any way to change font with this theme?

    I’m also considering Lingonberry. Is there any way to have some kind of sidebar or a top panel with this one? It seems not…?

    I think I can probably guess the answer you are going to give me to these questions – that all of these things could be done if I upgrade to Premium and so I can edit the CSS, but not otherwise. But I just thought I should check if I have missed anything, if any of these things can be done out of the box or if you have a perfect theme you recommend for academic portfolio sites…

    Maybe I’ll just go for Twenty Fifteen or Independent Publisher 2 which might meet my functionality needs better, even if they are a bit plain.

    Final question…. How do new themes get added to wordpress.com?

    Can developers donate themes to wordpress.com? e.g. if I created an Academic Profile theme what would it take to get it on wordpress.com… I assume there is some kind of selection process? If so is there a list of criteria you have to meet available?

    Sorry if that post was a little long – just really would welcome any pointers!

    Cheers.

    The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)

  • kathrynwp · Staff ·

    Hey, I think I recognize that name. ;-) /me waves

    However, I am struggling to find a wordpress.com theme that meets my needs.

    Of course I’m happy to help you find a theme.

    How about Independent Publisher?

    https://independentpublisher2demo.wordpress.com/

    If you find it too plain, you could choose one of the included custom colour palettes, in the Customizer‘s Colors & Backgrounds panel. Click “Palettes” and you can see the options:

    Customize Independent Publisher 2 A beautiful reader focused theme with a clean responsive layout ideal for personal bloggers

    And if you opt for a Premium plan, you’ll have even more colour options, including the ability to add custom CSS.

    One theme I have found that might do is Hexa. My question is, is there any way to make the menu with this theme on-by-default? I am concerned visitors won’t discover it / won’t click the hamburger?

    I’m also considering Sapor. Is there any way with that one to have a picture (gravatar image, say), appear top left, above the menu, where there is a dead white space, instead of below the menu?

    Both things could be accomplished with Custom CSS, which is available with the Premium or Business plans.

    I’m also considering Libre 2. But I don’t like the cursive/italicized script. Is there any way to change font with this theme?

    Yes: https://en.support.wordpress.com/custom-fonts/

    I’m also considering Lingonberry. Is there any way to have some kind of sidebar or a top panel with this one? It seems not…?

    No, those types of structural changes aren’t possible without a Business plan, which would let you create a child theme and add plugins.

    Final question…. How do new themes get added to wordpress.com?

    Can developers donate themes to wordpress.com? e.g. if I created an Academic Profile theme what would it take to get it on wordpress.com… I assume there is some kind of selection process? If so is there a list of criteria you have to meet available?

    We don’t accept submisssions; themes are created by our team’s developers or selected from WordPress.org for adaptation. That said, with a Business plan you can install whatever theme you like, including custom ones.

    Let me know if this answers all your Qs, and if you have more you know where to find me. ;-)

  • Unknown's avatar
    alexbowyer · Member ·

    Hi Kathryn!

    Great to hear from you! Lovely to get my response from a real life friend :-)

    Thanks for your responses, very helpful. I didn’t know about custom fonts so I will definitely check out that option with Libre 2.

    The rest is pretty much as I expected, that CSS editing is needed. Fair enough (though I do think in the case of Sapor, that that unusable dead whitespace at the top left is a really weird design oversight, not sure who that would suit!).

    I will consider upgrading for CSS support down the road, but as a first step I am mainly looking to consolidate a few sites and minimize costs and maintenance effort (family life doesn’t leave much time free for such things) so am limiting my search to out-of-the-box, free solutions.

    Thanks for explaining how themes get added to wordpress.com…. I guess in that case, I would just ask if you could pass on the feedback to whoever selects themes for wordpress.com, could they please consider creating (or adapting from wp.org) a theme or two that will work well for academic portfolios? There’s loads of business portfolio and artistic portfolio sites and it would be great if this gap could be filled in future.

    Cheers, and thanks for your reply!
    Alex

  • kathrynwp · Staff ·

    Hey Alex – I’m still not quite sure what you’re looking for in a theme that doesn’t exist in our collection already, so if you could show me a couple of examples you’ve seen of themes you consider well suited to academics, that would be really helpful. Thanks!

  • The topic ‘Finding the right theme for an academic portfolio site’ is closed to new replies.