Replicating Tumblr theme

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  macawmintcharon91867 · Member · Jan 9, 2022 at 10:20 pm

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  Hello,
  I’m thinking about moving my Tumblr blog to wordpress, and wondered if I could replicate a Tumblr theme that I had professional help customizing? I don’t like the Tumblr platform anymore, but I don’t want to lose all of the work I put into the design.

  Thank you,
  Kara

  WP.com: Yes
  Correct account: Yes

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

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  kokkieh · Staff · Jan 10, 2022 at 5:49 am

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  Hi Kara,

  That really depends on the current theme, and how it’s been customized.

  In theory, you can take any WordPress.com theme, override it’s current CSS using custom CSS code to “cancel out” the current design, and then write your own CSS from scratch. Or you can take a theme like Blank Canvas which already has only minimal styling, and then add your own.

  But you’ll be limited to CSS only, in other words, you won’t be able to add your own HTML elements to the theme, only customize the appearance of those elements already there.

  That said, in a few weeks WordPress 5.9 will come out, and that version includes the first version of the new site editor. The site editor allows you to use blocks in the editor to create a site layout from scratch. So you can essentially “build your own theme”, starting from Blank Canvas, adding the blocks you want in the site editor, and then styling it using either the block settings available in the editor, or custom CSS.

  So if you’re willing to hold out a bit, I’d recommend waiting for that, and then seeing what you can build for yourself in the Site Editor.

  Just a couple caveats:

  1) To use custom CSS you’ll need to be on at least out premium plan.

  2) Customization at this level is far outside of the scope of support we provide, so we won’t be able to help you with the code you need to make these changes. (https://wordpress.com/en/support/css-support/)

  Another option is to create a new WordPress theme from scratch, or as a child theme of another theme, that has the same design as your Tumblr theme. But for that you’d need an experienced WordPress theme developer as WordPress themes are written in PHP code, not HTML, and you’d also need to be on the Business Plan to install such a custom theme.

  If you’d like to pay someone to help you customize a WordPress theme like this, you can also fill out an application on this page, and someone will be in touch to discuss available options with you.