WordPress Hacks » Magazine WordPress Themes

WPZoom.com Releases Custom Zenko Magazine Theme

Kyle Eslick — Mon, 11 May 2009 09:00:55 +0000

For a couple years now, the premium themes market has been growing steadily and the competition has been elevated. Designers are pushing each other to be more innovative trying to earn your dollar, which is great for potential buyers like us, but can sometimes be difficult to for a new theme designer to jump in and hold their own.

One guy that has successfully done this, in my opinion, is Pavel Ciorici of WP Zoom. Earlier this year he released his first premium WordPress theme, the Yamidoo theme. The title of the theme is interesting enough that it grabs your attention, then when when you look at the theme, it is hard not be impressed!

Now, Pavel has released his second premium theme, the Zenko theme, which I wanted to mention here. With this new magazine theme, the homepage design is a traditional magazine theme layout, but is designed in a way to feature the most important content in areas where readers will see it. Here is a default sample of how the homepage features your top content:

Zenko Magazine Theme Homepage

The homepage is also very image intensive, which is an important part of a magazine-style homepage to draw the readers attention. For the internal pages, the Zenko theme switches to a more traditional blog page layout with the sidebar on the right side:

Zenko Magazine Theme Post Page

A full live demo of the Zenko theme can be viewed here.

The Zenko theme also includes a number of great features. Some of my favorite parts are the featured content and popular posts on the top of the homepage, the built-in navigation designed to function like the WP-PageNavi plugin, and of course the footer area, which was designed to provide a place for you to put your less important content (footer is a great place to put categories, archives, etc. so they are available for readers that want to find it, but is also out of the way for people not looking for it).

Other features included with the Zenko theme:

Built in support for Google Analytics and Feedburner
Integrated Banner Management System
Custom templates for categories, archives
Auto-resizing and cropping for images
Threaded Comments for WordPress 2.7+
Built-in widgets
Support for WordPress 2.7.1
Cross-Browser Compatible – tested on IE (6,7), Opera, Firefox, Safari, Chrome.
Flickr widget
Theme Documentation
Integrated Theme Options
Tabbed Widgets
Widgetized Sidebars
Built-in Gravatar Support for Authors & Comments
Drop-Down Menus
Integrated social bookmarking in posts
Photoshop Files (.psd) included

I also had the privilege of digging through the backend of this theme and was glad to see the code structure is very SEO friendly and well setup for someone who prefers to manually hack their code. Another thing that I really liked was the fact that this theme doesn’t require any WordPress plugins or custom fields to function properly. I always try to find at least one thing missing, and the one feature that I couldn’t find was the option of a traditional blog template for the homepage, which has become a pretty common addition with most premium themes.

Pavel also has a very competitive pricing structure, which allows just about any WordPress user to be able to acquire one of his themes. Currently, the Zenko theme can be purchased for $69.00 (single-use license), $119.00 (for 5 site license), or $149.00 (developer’s license).

Have questions? Want to learn more about this theme? Check out the official Zenko theme page by WP Zoom.

Darren Hoyt Releases Mimbo 3.0 Theme

Kyle Eslick — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 15:15:35 +0000

Though there are a number of popular magazine WordPress themes on the market, including a number of great free magazine themes, I think it is pretty safe to say that none have been more popular over the past year than the Mimbo theme (and the Mimbo Pro version).

This morning I just noticed that my friend Darren Hoyt, the author of Mimbo and Mimbo Pro, has updated his original free theme, calling it Mimbo 3.0.

Here is a screen shot of Mimbo 3.0:

You can view the live demo here. Here are the updates features in the newest version of Mimbo:

No more custom fields. Most importantly, custom fields are no longer necessary to call thumbnails. Mimbo 3.0 includes a script that pulls images automatically from the post body, then resizes them with TimThumb.
Support for WordPress 2.7. This includes code for sticky posts, comment pagination, threaded comments, wp_logout_url, and the rest of the new features.
Sticky Posts. In the past, you had to create a “Lead Story” category. With the new version, that beige box contains whichever post you’ve marked as sticky, or whichever is most recent.
Standard Bloggy Behavior. What I learned about Mimbo 2.2 is that a lot of people missed having a regular old blog component on the homepage, ie, simple chronological display. So I tried to retain the popular magazine-style layout, while organizing the middle column more like a standard blog.
Featured Categories. Thanks to some great coding help from the talented Jean-Baptiste, Mimbo 3.0 has a custom control panel that sets featured categories with a configurable number of headlines
Localization/Translation. As I’ve realized, there’s really no excuse for not localizing your WP themes so they can be enjoyed by people all over the world. Feel free to contact me with translation help.
125×125 Ad Support. Mimbo 3.0 comes pre-styled to work with the excellent WP125 plugin and its companion widget.
Better body id/classes. As I’ve written about, this can make your theme tremendously flexible, but now things are even flexible-er. Tip of the hat goes to Thematic, by way of Sandbox.
Multi-Level Dropdown Menus. People asked for them and now they’re here. They’re semi-transparent, too, if you use a decent browser.
Custom Sidebar Conditionals. If child pages exist, they will now appear in the sidebar when viewing a page section. And on single post pages, the sidebar will dynamically display a handy “Related Posts” box.
Better Custom Archives. Personally, I almost never browse by month or year. I prefer a full archived list with dated headers. Mimbo 3.0 comes with a custom template that displays posts organized by month, plus pagination.
Better Author Archives. Looking back, it’s not really necessary to have the author bio included at the bottom of every single post, as with v2.2. In the new version, author archives can be viewed only when the person’s name is clicked. Also, gravatars are now used for both author photos and comments. No more lame hacks.
Gallery, Inline Image & Caption Styling. There are now styles for all the various ways you’d insert an image in a post which became possible with version 2.5.
More Widget Freedom. In the past, I probably included too much custom code in the sidebar whereas most of it could be replicated/re-ordered with widgets anyway. So currently, the entire right-hand sidebar (minus the aforementioned Page submenu and “Related Posts” module) is widgetized and pre-styled for your pleasure.

[Download the Mimbo 3.0 Theme]

Magazine WordPress Themes Gallery

Kyle Eslick — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 09:00:12 +0000

Updated: May 13, 2012!

The internet is a dynamic place where things are always changing and adapting. And just like the internet, the blogosphere is also changing rapidly and seems to be particularly susceptible to trends. One prominent blogger will create a theme and the whole blogosphere will rush to follow.

One of the most recent trends in the blogosphere is the rise in popularity of many magazine WordPress themes. Many of them are paid themes, but there are also a few free magazine WordPress themes for people to download. This post is our attempt to collect both in one place for your convenience, with the last few remaining free themes being highlighted at the top and the premium magazine themes being highlighted below that.

Of course this collection is being updated regularly so check back regularly to see what new magazine themes have become available!!

Free Magazine WordPress Themes

Small Magazine Theme

Source | Download | (Unable to Locate a Demo)

Premium News Theme

Source | Download | Demo

Premium Magazine WordPress Themes

Lifestyle Theme

Child Theme of Genesis Theme Framework

Multiple-Use ($59.95), All StudioPress Themes ($249.95)

WordPress Hacks » Magazine WordPress Themes

WPZoom.com Releases Custom Zenko Magazine Theme

Zenko Magazine Theme Homepage

Zenko Magazine Theme Post Page

Darren Hoyt Releases Mimbo 3.0 Theme

Magazine WordPress Themes Gallery

Free Magazine WordPress Themes

Scarlett Theme

Hamasaki Theme

Rebel Magazine Theme

Arthemia Free Theme (Premium Version Also Available)

Jello Wala Mello Theme

Mimbo Theme

WP Gold Theme

Morning After Theme

Forte Theme

Small Magazine Theme

Premium News Theme

Premium Magazine WordPress Themes

Lifestyle Theme

WP Smooth Theme

Elisa Magazine Theme

Zenko Magazine Theme

Spectrum Theme

Magazine WordPress Theme

Reflecta Magazine Theme

Blissful Theme

Manifesto Magazine Theme

Delicious Child Theme

WP-Chatter Magazine Theme

Initiate Magazine Theme

Sleek Theme

WP Sublime Theme

Estate Theme

Boutique Theme

Stunning Magazine Theme

Headline News Theme

WP-Prosper Magazine Theme

News Flash Theme

Minimal Theme

Mocha Theme

Gourmet Cooking Theme

Platinum Theme

Tribune News Theme

Polished Theme

Amped Theme

Gadget Theme

Streamline Theme

Evertis Magazine Theme

Serenity Theme

Blog Newspaper Theme

NewsTube Theme

Emporium E-Commerce Theme

Monograph Magazine Theme

News WordPress Theme

Cube Light Theme

WP Launch Theme

eNews Theme

WP Ellie Theme

Lexicon Theme

Sea Light Business Theme

My App WordPress Theme

Lumin Magazine Theme

WP Genius Theme

Optimize Theme

Bigfoot Theme

Going Green Theme

Bold Magazine Theme

Arthemia Premium Theme

The Source Theme

Vega Magazine Theme

Memoir Theme

Crystal Theme

Newswire Theme

Nova Theme

My Cuisine Theme

Fabric Theme

Yamidoo Magazine Theme

Glider Theme

WP Media Magazine Theme