This post follows on from “Creating Your Own Theme“. In this tutorial I will show you how to set up the folders for your new WordPress theme and also how to create the all important style.css file which contains the information about your theme as well as the style rules for the design.
The first thing you need to do is to open your wp-content/themes folder and create a new folder naming it the name of your new theme. In this example we will simply use the name test-theme. They create a blank file (you can even do this in notepad. The information below is the important code that must go at the top of your style.css file. This tells WordPress important things about your theme such as its name, who wrote it and a link to the authors website. The code that you need to add to the very top is:
/*
Theme Name:
Theme URI:
Description:
Version:
Author:
Author URI: http://
Tags:
*/
You need to fill in the appropriate information when adding it to your stylesheet. Once you have this code at the top you can then save your stylesheet. You must save it in your themes folder inside the wp-content/themes folder of WordPress. You must also name the file style.css. This is the name the WordPress looks for and therefore it is important that the name is correct. The video below demonstrates this:
The final thing that needs to be done in order to finish of the stylesheet is that you need to take a screenshot of your design. You should then name this screenshot.png and then save this again inside your new themes folder. This is the image that is used to show a thumbnail of your theme along with the information you have just entered at the top of the stylesheet when you activate your theme in the WordPress design tab from the admin section.
In the next tutorial we will concentrate on the header.php file of your theme and get that coded to make you a custom theme.
