Theme Review: Urbane
Due to the popularity of magazine-style themes, designers have been trying hard to keep up with demand. You only have to Google 'wordpress magazine style themes' or something similar to see the results. Back in March I even wrote a post in which I listed some of the very best free magazine-style themes I have come across. (see WordPress Magazine Themes Revisted)
Since that time many more have appeared. While most are interesting, a few really caught my eye. One such example is Urbane by Jai Nischal Verma of Blog Oh Blog fame.
Urbane is a clean and fast loading theme with a pleasing colour palette as you can see in the screen shot below. (click image to enlarge)
I think what really adds to the appearance of Urbane is its use of a light background image for the various content blocks on the home page. Speaking of the home page, it sports a 'featured post' section with 3 other sections directly beneath it all pulling excerpts - complete with thumbnail images - from the category of your choosing. It is all configurable from the theme's Options page. There is no need to use custom fields for thumbnails either. Simply upload an image to your post and Urbane will automagically create and display the thumbnail. Below that can be found 3 more content blocks - one containing the search engine and links to both the archives and categories, the second which is used to display excerpts of the 2 most recent posts and the third holding the blogroll. Directly beneath that you will find 3 fully widgetized content blocks. As if that isn't enough, at the top of the home page to the right of the 'feature post' section there is a content block holding one of those neat javascript tabbers. Out of the box it is used to display the 6 most popular posts, the 6 more recent posts and subscription options.
Further options that can be set from the backend include Feedburner Name and ID, Twitter ID, toggle thumbnails off/on and even the footer text. Have a look at the screen shot below. (click image to enlarge)
Urbane requires no special plugins to run and installs as easily as any other WordPress theme. If you're in the market for a magazine-style theme I suggest taking this one out for a test drive.
Len has been blogging for over 10 years and is a rabid WordPress fan. In addition to blogging here you can find him writing the occasional article and toiling away in the forums at WeblogToolsCollection.com. He also hangs out at the WordPress support forums lending a hand where he can. You can also find him at his other blog LenKutchma.com
hi! it’s a great theme, the best one after weeks of search! I have wordpress 2.8.4 but
thumbnails don’t appear (I chose ‘yes’ in the ‘Options’); and the title of the article appear two times! please help me.
thanksss!!!
http://www.giuliascrive.it
Hi Itzpa,
The theme uses the TimThumb script so all you have to do is upload an image to your post and the script will automatically use it - no need for custom fields. If it is not working it could be due to some type of server configuration. Have you tried asking this question at BlogOhBlog? Perhaps someone else has encountered this problem and has posted a solution.