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Automattic is a cool start up company that has made some great widgets, sites and templates. Pilcrow is no different to its other products – it’s dynamic, easy to use and gives you a good range of options. Pilcrow is an upgrade from PressRow but packed with much more flexibility and benefits. The default theme of Pilcrow is deceivingly simple and plain. Don’t let that fool you as this theme is fully customizable, down to the very little details.

Often I hear complaints about the lack of layout options available with the free WordPress themes. Bloggers are tired of two-column themes with the sidebar on the right-hand-side. Pilcrow tackles this problem by providing you with six different layout options. From two-columns, to three-columns and even has the hard to find one column layout.

The main content width is only 500px. If you’re looking to include high-res, large images, then you might opt for the full-width layout that provides you with a generous width 900px.

What I love the most about Pilcrow is that you can completely revamp the look and feel of your blog. The quickest and easiest way is to simply change the color scheme. There are four to choose from: Light, dark, brown and red. The color scheme doesn’t just change the background color, but also the fonts, links and highlights.

If you’re looking to give your blog a complete makeover, then Pilcrow offers you the flexibility to change the background image and also the header. Along with the other custom options, you’d have an endless of possibilities to have the blog looking the way you want it to.

Pilcrow also provides you with plenty of widget spaces. If you choose to have the three-column layout, you’re given an additional ‘Feature Area’ along with a ‘Secondary Sidebar.’ If you’re worried about widget space when you have the full-width layout, then you’d be pleased to know that there are two footer areas.

The theme supports a drop down, custom menu. Although this is pretty standard now with most WordPress themes. You can effortlessly set this up in the backend under Appearances.

A little nifty thing I like about this theme is how the comment profiles are displayed. Hovering over a profile pic would bring up a small lightbox with profile details and also personal links to social media sites.

Pilcrow is definitely a WordPress theme for those of you who love to customize the look and feel of a blog. The multiple layouts, different color schemes and options to change the header and background will definitely keep you busy as you mix and match options.

Firstly, don’t let the word ‘grunge’ scare you off with this theme. I understand how most grunge themes on WordPress tend to be more focused on the artistic graphics rather than usability. I’ve come across a few grunge themes where’s it too dark, making the font barely legible. Elegant Grunge on the other hand uses subtle grunge elements. There’s no over-the-top filth effect that can clutter a blog. It’s surprisingly clean and as the name puts it, elegant grunge.

When I first saw this blog, I wouldn’t have guessed it was based on a grunge design. The grime details are kept to an absolute minimum. Instead of industrial textures, Elegant Grunge has soft fade marks, faint gray tarnishes and light torn paper edges. The white background makes the theme appear more clean and crisp, along with making the articles easier to read.

Each article is also presented neatly without any distractions. The post information such as date, time, tags and categories are bundled together at the bottom. The comments are presented like individual notes.

What makes Elegant Grunge a standout are its custom features. Theme Options offer four different layouts, enabling you to change from full-width, to three-column layout at a click of a button.

In addition to the two-column layout, you have the option to choose where to place the sidebar. Great if you’re looking for a left sidebar layout, which surprisingly not many other themes offer. If you are going for the full-width layout, you can still include your usual widgets in its three-column footer.

Elegant Grunge supports a custom menu and also a custom header. I would definitely recommend to upload your own header rather than just leaving it blank by default. A torn paper edge effect is automatically applied to the image, giving it an interesting twist.

Elegant Grunge is a flexible and universal theme as the grunge element is kept to a minimum. It’s a great WordPress theme due to its custom options — especially being able to choose the template layout. If you’re looking for a theme that isn’t too dark or heavy, but still has a touch of attitude, then Elegant Grunge could be what you’re looking for.

Monochrome is a sleek and compact WordPress theme. It demonstrates that great aesthetics can be combined with easy functionality. Sometimes keeping it simple is all you need for a great looking blog.

As the name suggests, Monochrome predominantly has the colors black and white as its theme. However, unlike other darker templates, the light gray area around the black panels keeps this theme looking fresh at the same time. The article posts are on a white background so the words remain easier to read than an inverted color scheme.

Monochrome is a three-column theme that makes the most of its space. I like the inclusion of small amounts of colors like blues, greens, yellows and reds. They make details like dates, comments and the RSS feed icon really stand out against the dark background. Nothing ever looks too cluttered and the focus is always on the middle column where your articles are.

The attention to details of Monochrome is what really makes it stand out. From the subtle roll over effects to the neat layout, crisp lines and curved corners. It supports a drop down menu bar and has few nifty tools of its own.

Although you can’t customize the layout, heading or colors of this theme, Monochrome still offers a few options in the backend. Under Theme Options, you can tick and untick a variety of simple add-ons to your blog. For example an information title box, RSS feed, how you want to present the search box and what details you want to display for each post.

One of my favorite features about this theme is the clever inclusion of the ‘Return Top’ side link on the right bottom hand corner. It’s a great tool for if you have longer articles or feature a bunch of posts on the front page. Your reader can go to the top of the page at any time with just a simple click.

On mono-lab’s demo page, I also spotted what appears to be a lightbox. Thumbnail images can be expanded on the page in a pop-up box. However, I haven’t managed to get this to work on my demo site. If you have any clues as to how to do this, let us know. It would be great to have this feature properly working too.

Monochrome is definitely a classy theme that utilizes its compactness. It tones down the boldness of the black and white colors without being dull and boring. You would love the small features of this blog. And although there isn’t much you can tailor in terms of the look and layout, you’d be equally as happy tweaking the available options to your own liking.

Coraline comes across as a neat and clean WordPress theme that might be on the bland side of things. The default settings make this theme appear too simple, but scratch the surface a bit deeper and you’d soon realize that there are loads of custom options available with Coraline.

Coraline offers multiple layouts and it’s very impressive. There are five different options that pretty much cover any layout you can think of. With different two-column and three-column styles, you won’t be disappointed with the choices. You can have the main sidebar on the left-hand-side, right-hand-side or even both!

If you like including lots of widgets in your blog, then you’re going to love seven different widgetized areas. The four-column footer area is a perfect way to display text, clouds and tags in a more compact manner.

If you’re using the three-column layout, then you have the additional secondary widget area too. What’s great about Coraline is that it has enough white space in its layout so all your widgets don’t look cluttered or over-lapping anywhere. The font used in the sidebar is big enough to be legible, but small enough so it doesn’t divert the focus too much from the main posts.

This theme also features a custom menu bar with drop down support. What’s really nifty is the ability to include a sticky post that appears above all your other posts. Setting this up is pretty straight-forward. All you need to do is to check the ‘sticky’ box under ‘Publish’ when you’re writing or editing a post.

If you’re still looking for more ways to customize your blog, then you’d appreciate the dark theme option found under ‘Theme Options’ in the backend.

If you wanted to, you can also customize the background and header. There are three default headers but I think you can find cooler ones that aren’t so nature-centric.

If you wish to preview Coraline for yourself, you can click here.

Spectrum is a newly released WordPress theme. As the name suggests, it is quite a colorful template with rainbow spectrums plastered at the top. However, it still comes across as a simple, clean theme without being too over the top, or blinding with various colors.

Spectrum is a two-column layout, with the main column being very prominent as it’s a lot wider. The widgitized sidebar doesn’t allow much room for too much text or images as it can look quite crammed. There’s not much white space between the sidebar and main article.

Although the headers for each title of the sidebar section have a transparent effect, they are still very bulky and thick. That doesn’t really help with the already limited white space. Nevertheless, I like the cute icons that come with certain widgets and the hints of color as you roll-over the links.

The translucent header part makes a stylish inclusion as it fades into opaque white. The compact translucent menu bar on the top right-hand-side ties in nicely with the theme. This see-through effect isn’t as prominent with the default rainbow swirls in the background. Thankfully, Spectrum allows you to custom your background and header.

There’s the custom option to feature a tag cloud in the footer area. If you have a lot of tags, it can be quite a nice, colorful inclusion.

If we just focus on the main posts, the use of transparency is carried across in the muted gray details. The green colored title headers add a refreshing hint of color. I also like the mini colored ‘category’ and ‘tagged’ icons.

The threaded comments are a nice component. It definitely makes it easier to read and navigate the comments section.

Spectrum is a very straightforward theme that allows for basic customization like changing the background and header. However, if you’re looking to really spice it up, it’s pretty limited unless you’re able to fiddle around with the CSS.

The theme definitely provides you with the basic features you require in a blog. Spectrum is great if you want the focus to be on your articles and don’t plan to clutter your sidebar with too much personalized text and images.

To try out Spectrum, head to the demo site.