Today I’m writing (lamenting?) about Writr, an old WordPress theme that I first used when I launched Jason Journals in March, 2017. It’s long been abandoned by WordPress. Sad trombone. Frown emoji. Boo-hiss.
Though Writr isn’t available on WP.com anymore, it looks like one could download it for use on a WP.org site. Either way, though, the theme seems officially unsupported now.
It’s a very nice and elegant looking theme, simple yet bold; you can visit a demo here. A prominent sidebar graced the left side. Main content ruled the rest of the page. Though it’s a common layout, the design struck me. In fact, it is similar to my current theme (Wilson). I like how Writr used post-formats with simple icons in a side-rail.
This “classic” theme represents others like it that I recall from memory but can no longer find on WP.com. As time marches on, WordPress drops things. I fear one day, all “classic” themes will be purged, leaving only the new block-based editor themes.
Is it just me, or do many of the blocky site-editor themes all look kind of the same? They’re simple, minimal, and unadorned. It’s almost like plain templates were output by a boring A.I. with zero design creativity. Where’s the flair, the flourishes, the “personal” touches?
I prefer the classic styles in all their variety. Some of them, like Writr, greatly utilized post-formats to showcase posts in unique and helpful ways. There are a few that still do this. But the more ambitious ones all seem to have been deleted from the WP servers.
I shouldn’t complain though. If I want classic blog themes, I know where to go: Blogger. It still has the Simple theme from close to 20 years ago! If WordPress is guilty for marching forward, then Blogger (Google) is just as guilty for lagging behind.
But I already went back to Blogger last year and returned home to WordPress; I won’t undo or redo all of that. But it does make me further appreciate my HTML site (at Neocities) since I can customize it however I wish. The only limit is my lack of web coding knowledge, which isn’t too hard to overcome. I’m already enjoying progress in that regard.
Hopefully I don't sound like an aging blog-o-saur, lamenting the "good ol' days" of blogging, when times were simpler. You know, it really doesn't take all that much to get some text online (again, just look at Blogger). WordPress worked before Gutenberg and blocks; is it really better now?
Anyways, I digress. Writr is (was) a great theme that I wish wasn't written off.