The Full Stack Leader

I’m proud to call myself a WordPress contributor yet again with the recent 3.8 “Parker” release. This is an amazing update to the world’s best CMS, with a focus on device support in the refreshed admin interface, better widget and theme administration, a new default theme, and much more.

As with Twenty Twelve and Twenty Thirteen my primary role in the project was launching a new default theme, Twenty Fourteen. This time the goal was a bit different: create a beautiful magazine-style site with WordPress. And launch it before the new year.

Twenty Fourteen started with an all-star team of Takashi Irie (designer) and Konstantin Obenland (lead developer) and we were joined by many contributors in the WordPress community, notably Nick Halsey (aka celloexpressions) who’d contributed to previous default themes and had a big impact again.

As with Twenty Twelve WordCamp contributor days were a big highlight for me during the 3.8 cycle. For 3.8 and Twenty Fourteen kicked things off at WCSF 2013 contributor day and then did a bunch of testing at WordCamp London (see the above photos for beautiful evidence). It was amazing to meet other WordPress contributors in person, work and talk together, and improve the software we love and use daily—people like Joan and Ben. This is why I love being a part of this community!

More about Twenty Fourteen:

– Twenty Fourteen demo site to see it in action.
– Takashi’s recap and the design decisions for Further (the predecessor to Twenty Fourteen).
– The Fourteen Colors plugin by Nick Halsey in case you’d like to customize the look a bit more.
– Background post on WPTavern: WordPress 3.8 – Taking The Default Theme Further.
– The philosophy behind default WordPress themes—and why they are named after the year (Twenty Twelve, Thirteen, Fourteen… ): Why Default Themes Change Each Year.

Enjoy, and happy new year.