Cath from Phase Creative (Sydney) presented these slides at the WordPress Sydney Meetup in Jan 2014. A run through of her workflow demonstrated as a case study. Almost Custom: customising a WordPress website using a Genesis Child theme

1. www.phasecreative.com.au
Almost Custom ...it’s childs play!

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Overview
Design workflow for customising a WordPress
website using a Genesis Child theme
Basic customisation
• Typopgraphy
• Colours
• Integration of logo and logo elements
• Images and image treatments
• Backgrounds and textures
Extras
• Custom templates
• Custom widgets
• Custom functionality
PRO TIP:
Provide a definition of
customisation in your
contract and state the
limitations of the process

3. www.phasecreative.com.au
Toolkit:
Some of my favourites
GENESIS
CREATIVE
CLOUD
DYNAMIK
ASANA
CODA
FIREBUG
MAMP
INVISION

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PRO TIP:
Create a master to-do list
for your sites in asana,
duplicate for each site &
add/edit as you need

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Basic Workflow
• Take a design brief
• Get content from client (!!)
• Discuss structual placement, user journey and devise sitemap
• Decide the best child theme base, don’t always show client
• Mock up homepage for discussion, make any changes
• Mock up internal page(s) for review / revisions
• Once approved, set up on MAMP with pre-built plugin set
• Build out & upload to staging server (cheapy shared host)
• Send link for client to view, get feeback
• Build out remaining client content with changes
• Test, send link again, make any required changes, test again
• Once approved (and paid for), upload to client server for launch

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Case Study
Maaike Furniture Resurrection
Brief:
• Existing WordPress blog with over 300 posts spanning 4 years
• Time to position as high-end artisan creative
• Galleries and blog a focus - wanted grid blog
• Needed online quote form
• Wanted to look more like a website than a blog
• Clean, neutral design so her pieces would sing
My one big wish is for a
really great gallery page.

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Approach
• Maaike’s content was ready. She was very organised.
• She had a photoshoot done so great photos to work with
• I flicked her ‘Foodie’, along with a few others to look at for the bones

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“I only really looked at the foodie child theme, and
wet my pants with excitement.
Design adjustments required
• Typography
• Colour palette
• Imagery
Structual changes
• New homepage
• New gallery template
• New newsletter call to action
• Blog layed out as a grid

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IT’S BEAUTIFUL!!! Everything I imagined. So damn spot on
I’m almost disappointed that there’s not a surprise element.
And then I saw the sketch details in the top and bottom bars
and got a little surprise. And a little teary.

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Delivery
• Make screengrab. I always credit the original designer

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Pros
• Swift production process, many turn-key elements
• Testing has mostly been done on the child theme
• Client can see proof of concept before you start
• Community help when using well supported framework
• You can get familiar with the themes
• You can bank your own child themes along the way
Cons
• Lack of appreciation for the value of the process
• Clients misunderstand ‘custom’ to mean ‘bespoke’ so there is
an education process
• Not as many bells & whistles - managing expectations
• You don’t always ‘know’ the code so it can be trial and error

14. www.phasecreative.com.au
Links & Resources
• Foodie theme: http://shaybocks.com/foodie/
• Genesis framework: http://my.studiopress.com/themes/genesis/
• Asana: https://app.asana.com/
• Adobe Creative Cloud: http://www.adobe.com/au/products/creativecloud.html
• MAMP: www.mamp.info/
• Coda 2: http://panic.com/coda/
• Dynamik by Cobalt Apps: http://cobaltapps.com/
• Firebug: https://getfirebug.com/
• Invision: http://www.invisionapp.com/

15. www.phasecreative.com.au
Thank you :-)
Cath Beaton is a Sydney based WordPress
consultant and web designer with a passion
for helping small business professionals
maximise their online impact.
More info
• Web: phasecreative.com.au
• Twitter: @phasecreative
• Email: hello@phasecreative.com.au
• Phone: 0402 040 049
• Location: Sydney