StudioPress is one of the best WordPress theme developers (in my view) offering premium WordPress themes. I like many other premium theme developers as well, but StudioPress is up there in my esteem because they deliver stylish, highly functional, and easily customizable themes (not the easiest to customize, but relatively easy).
StudioPress started small like all businesses do, but has grown into one of the larger and more successful WP theme developers. They consist of a team of developers and project managers. When you buy from StudioPress you aren’t left figuring things out for yourself – you get help through the very active forum and many tutorials.
Sure, it’s a hassle learning, but once you do learn how to use StudioPress themes (or any theme for that matter), you can build your own websites which is extremely cool. Besides, there’s a learning curve with any theme you buy.
About the StudioPress Theme Style and Design
If I had to choose one phrase to describe StudioPress themes it would be “crisp and clean loaded with functionality and easy SEO configuration”. Every theme (I don’t like all of them) has a crisp look with excellent attention to detail. I a big fan of about half of their offerings (which is a pretty good ratio for larger theme developers). I use several of their themes on numerous websites I publish.
When you view StudioPress themes, take a look at their graphical detail – gradients, shadows, color selection, layout precision (and flexibility), and clean lines.
Another attribute common with StudioPress themes is the way their themes give you the option of pulling snippets and titles of your posts and pages on the home page (called Featured Posts). This way you can feature your best content on your home page and/or sidebar. It creates for a great website visitor user experience. Themes that are particularly good at this include News, Magazine, Lifestyle, and Streamline. However, with use of widgets, you can do this in all their themes.
Pricing and Licensing
Simple pricing is the StudioPress model. You can buy a single theme, multiple themes, or buy total and unrestricted access to all present AND future themes for one price ($249.95 at the time this article was published). When you buy a theme from StudioPress you don’t pay again in the future. Every license you buy let’s you build as many websites as you wish with the theme. In addition to liking many of their themes, I like their pricing model. It doesn’t get much simpler.
About StudioPress Support
You can’t call them on the phone for help. But, you can post your questions in their dynamic forum. At first I thought getting help through a forum would be a hassle. However, over time I’ve come to like it. More often than not my question or issue was already asked and answered so I can find the solution quickly.
Other times, I post a question and a senior moderator with StudioPress posts an answer very quickly. Sure, I’d prefer to call a toll-free number and have a developer solve all my problems immediately – but then I would have paid more for the themes.
The Parent and Child Theme Framework with Genesis
When you buy from StudioPress, you need to buy the Genesis theme and then choose a child theme. Genesis is the parent, and then the color scheme, layout, and design is dictated by the child theme you choose. This may seem odd if you’re new to WordPress, but it actually makes for much easier website creation. You can also much more easily switch the design of your site without losing any of your work (unless you spent a lot of time actually changing the CSS of a child theme).
You can also very easily update your theme – in fact all you need do is click a button (and StudioPress tells you about upgrades) and your site remains unaffected. This is because you upgrade the parent theme which won’t upset your style and design.
My Two StudioPress Criticisms
No business or service or product is perfect. StudioPress is no exception. I don’t like their pull-down menus. I find they stick sometimes.
I also don’t like the fact I can’t upload headers in the WordPress dashboard (except for the Prose child theme).
