Notepad Chaos: A Free WordPress Theme
Over the last years we’ve featured a number of designers and developers who released their work for free — among other things we presented high-quality free fonts, free WordPress themes, free wallpapers and, of course, free icons. You can find many of them in our section Freebies.
Every release helps to make the Web a nicer place which is why we support designers and challenge them to release something for free in order to be featured on Smashing Magazine. And the results are quite often pretty impressive.
Today we are glad to release Notepad Chaos — a free professional WordPress-theme. The theme has 2 columns, a quite vibrant design including “personal” design elements such as handwritten headings, stick-it-notes, clips and pins. The theme was designed by Evan Eckard especially for Smashing Magazine and its readers.
Download the theme for free!
You can use the theme for all your projects for free and without any restrictions. However, it’s forbidden to sell or redistribute the theme without both designer’s and Smashing Magazine’s permission — please link to this article if you would like to spread the word. You may modify the theme as you wish, but if you are planning to release your modification, please ask our permission first.
- Preview (0.4 Mb)
- Download the theme (.zip-package, 0.5 Mb)
- Download PSD-sources (.zip-package, 5 Mb)
- Notepad Chaos 2.0: Official Release and Download page
The theme has been updated to version 1.5. It’s now up-to-date with cleaner code and includes a lot more functionality (gravatars, dynamic sidebars, etc.). You can find the files and demo here.
Motivation behind the design
Here are some insights about the design process and development from the designer himself.
“I had recently stumbled upon many websites with gorgeous, gigantic, illustrated backgrounds and wanted to try my hand at creating a site that shared that similar element. This theme was an experiment into layering multiple images and having everything line up and flow with the site’s content.
Among other things, the Notepad Chaos theme has handwritten search box and navigation at the top of the layout.
It was quite a challenge to develop the design after creating it, but in the end it helped me gain more experience in CSS and what we designers can do to try and create sites with plenty of visual depth. On the technical side of things, the theme doesn’t use any plugins or extras, and focuses simply on the design.
Sidebar in the Notepad Chaos is designed as a post-it-note and clipped at the top.
The themes uses a custom field called “thumbnail” where the user can add an image to their post. The instructions are within the readme file along with how to set up the menu links.”
Thank you, Evan. We appreciate your work and your good intentions.
Last but not least…
We are regularly looking for creative designers and artists. You may not know it yet, but we might feature you in one of our upcoming posts.
If you would like to release a high-quality free font, a WordPress-theme, some wallpapers or an icon-set please contact us — we would like to support you (both financially and with the broad coverage on Smashing Magazine).
You may be interested in the following free WordPress-themes as well:
cris juárez
November 5th, 2008 6:49 pmCongratulations, your design is so beautiful, and is the best that i´ve never seen in wordpress.
pete
November 7th, 2008 12:43 amHow do you add widgets to the theme?
杜宇
November 10th, 2008 4:35 ambeautiful
Raleighwould
November 11th, 2008 5:19 amLooks great but doesn’t work in Firefox or IE7
franc3s
November 12th, 2008 10:33 amHi all!
How can we make it widget ready? Im not skilled in this, but maybe all together we can do something!
caryl
November 15th, 2008 12:49 amsmashing! id love to use this theme… this very beautiful theme… it’s really… [breathtaking]… lolz…
**Holly**
November 15th, 2008 9:28 amis there a version for the free non-hosting wordpress???
dev
November 16th, 2008 3:03 amawesome
Mark
November 16th, 2008 10:08 amHow do i modify this to make this widget ready?
Emily
November 18th, 2008 9:45 amAnyone know the font used in this theme so that I can modify the Category headings?
killroy
November 27th, 2008 7:44 pmnice layout..
but how 2 change link at HOME, ABOUT and ARCHIVES?
Merchantprince
November 29th, 2008 11:53 amI’ve just installed this for my sisters WP blog and everything is fine, save for how I might populate the Archives page. Is there some kind of plugin she should have? I edited the php file and the page displays fine, but there is no content.
Gorgeous theme! Thx
pageCarver
November 30th, 2008 2:37 amHi,
I’m using this as the template of my personal blog. Problem is, Archives link, when clicked is not working.
I followed the step. Go to WP Write new page, title=archives, page template=archives, but it’s going to “About” page.
I noticed that the code behind the archives link is
Archives
I found that on the navigation.php. Why does it have the same page id as About page which is “/?page_id=2″ as well.
Is this some sort of a coding mistake? Should I edit anything on the navigation.php to make it work?
Thanks.
Felipe Alvarez
December 2nd, 2008 1:44 amThis template does NOT validate under w3.org. 13 XHTML Errors. Please look at http://felipe1982.com/blog/
Q
December 7th, 2008 4:56 pmI think this is a beautiful theme & have downloaded it, although I am technically challenged & may not be able to use it! Amazing to find such wonderful artwork for free! Thank you :-)
biskuvit
December 9th, 2008 12:37 amvery good job!
simone
December 12th, 2008 1:37 ami’t a very nice theme but how can i set up widget?
Jeremy Collins
December 15th, 2008 7:43 amHow do I setup the Widgets.. The sidebar is not working
Raman
December 18th, 2008 12:02 amThank you very much for your template. I’m using it now for my blog.
PureBuddy
December 23rd, 2008 8:08 pmThanks, It’s a Greate theme. I’m using, too.
and do you have any idea to update this theme for wordpress 2.7?
I want to support threaded comments. :( but, I can’t do that…
hemang rami
December 25th, 2008 11:43 pmreally great i got that what i need thanks a lot buddy thanks
Connie
December 29th, 2008 12:45 amAnyone been able to get the sidebar to recognize widgets? It’s the only downfall of this gorgeous piece of work.
Thanks!
Jimmy
December 30th, 2008 1:16 amHi
Thank you for this wonderful theme and I have a couple of doubts to ask before i use this. How do you place a page as the home page rather than the posts. I have selected page in reading settings and my settings are ok. but the theme doesn’t recognize that. Also tell me how can i stretch the content and sidebar a little bit more and lessen the margins. My site is http://www.jimmy.gs . I would really appreciate your help
sue
December 30th, 2008 10:02 pmthanks ..^^
happy new year!!
widya
December 31st, 2008 10:00 amThanks vm for this theme & Happy new year.
Junghae
January 3rd, 2009 10:56 amHappy new year.
SooJung
January 4th, 2009 3:35 pmThe theme is very pretty. =)
And people, having a second opinion is not a bad thing. It helps people improve their layouts but there is no need for comment after another stating that this layout looks oddly like webdesignerwall.com layout. If you have something negative to say, such as this layout is a ‘rip-off” that is not constructive criticism at all.
And he is providing this layout for FREE.
antalya
January 6th, 2009 1:52 pmThank you so much!
http://www.antalyada.gen.tr
Bloggerwangi
January 9th, 2009 9:02 pmWow niche template, thanks very much!
Sam
January 14th, 2009 1:33 amCan the sidebar be widgetized? How? Help plz!
very nice theme. just cant use due to it not being widgetized. So can anyone help?
Kaavie
January 22nd, 2009 2:03 amvery beautiful,good work,i like it!
Happy new year!
Jessica
January 24th, 2009 11:08 pmThis is beautiful. Very nice job.
Lamanite
January 26th, 2009 11:31 amIt doesn’t look like any of the preview or download links work anymore. Which sucks, ’cause it looks like any awesome layout
Dada
January 28th, 2009 5:43 amim using this now and I was able to widgetize it, im so not happy with the outcome though coz i’m really having a hard time making the widgets in order. “recent posts” appears to be the first on the list.. :-( can anyone help me?
Screenplay Girl
January 28th, 2009 8:14 amI love the look of this theme, but my control panel says that it is not ‘widget aware’. Am I doing something wrong, or does it not use widgets?
Billy Dennis
January 31st, 2009 8:15 amFirst, thank you for the wonderful theme. I’m using on my WordPress Mu site. Two member bloggers are using it.
Here is the problem: I’m using BuddyPress on the site, and it’s supposed to generate an admin bar that lets the blog’s owner get access to profile and messaging features. But it’s just now showing up on this theme.
Any advice?
alifjuman
February 6th, 2009 6:22 pmapik tenan theme iki….
very nice theme…
ma ahsana hadza theme…
cilacap zone
AC
February 8th, 2009 5:39 amWow. Nice theme. :D
I’ll be using it in our project blog. :D Thanks for sharing such an awesome theme! I’ll say more after I actually install it in our blog. :)
Susanne
February 15th, 2009 5:14 pmI’ll add my ‘job well done’! to everyone’s comments too. I’ve loved it, used it and I’ll still working on my site with this template. I had no idea so many others were using this too.
I’ll love some feedback on using the Blog pages and how to change the handwritten parts. This is my first website and I think I’m doing pretty good with such a complex template. Any help would be appreciated though! Susanne from Aussieland!
michelle
February 17th, 2009 10:24 pmHi,
I’m trying to use this awesome theme in either typepad or blogger, but am having no luck. Yes, I know that it is a WP theme, but have seen it used several times on blogger. How difficult is it to use it in something other than WP? Any help is appreciated!
Thanks!
Chris
February 18th, 2009 12:06 pmHi, has anybody a source where to get this theme widgetready?
I tried to modify it as the wordpress help said, but I failed :-(
Thanks.
Konstantin
February 19th, 2009 12:01 pmEach time when I see something similar, it’s intercepts my breath literally! Very beautifull, new, somewhere even witty. Remarkably!
raiderhost
February 23rd, 2009 5:12 pmit show delicious wordpress template.
i very like it for diary of my blog
Rich
February 28th, 2009 4:38 am…being a novice designer myself, layouts such as these give me inspiration and drive to where i’d like to be but also gives me a bench mark as to where i am in the field! constructive criticism is always welcome as a designer but i wonder what the work is like of some of the more negative responses? i wonder if are they’re “avant-garde” or continually breaking new ground and pushing the boundaries of web deign? how many completely “original” designs are out there nowadays anyway? many layouts are a combination of ideas and themes of other great work that’s out there with a personal spin added! i think it’s very aesthetically pleasing to the eye, even if loosely based on wdw! i had a very similar idea as a layout and will definitely take a look at how it’s constructed to help me learn the business! keep up the good work mate! top notch stuff and i say bollocks to all the negativity!
cheers!
karsono
March 3rd, 2009 11:00 pmverry-veryy goodd.. may i change the code please
Ashis
March 4th, 2009 1:55 pmSome one had a lot of free time & a flair for hard work.
dario
March 6th, 2009 9:27 amit is really nice theme
m.
March 19th, 2009 9:31 amGreat theme, thanks for sharing this. I’ve modified it a little to use in my blog. :)
Cris
March 21st, 2010 10:55 amHi I dont know why but I couldn’t download this theme. Would u mind to help me pls?
Many thanks
Cristina
Jonathan Enns
March 19th, 2009 11:36 amBeautiful! However,
It doesn’t work when I install it! No preview, just blank gray. I have re-downloaded, reinstalled 3 times. I even downloaded some other themes and they work!
Im on WP 2.7.
Any ideas?
Jonathan Enns
March 19th, 2009 12:12 pmThe issue with the theme not working was due to permissions. I chmodded the folder to 777 and all works like a charm.
zeav
March 22nd, 2009 3:02 amNICEE !!
thanks a lot
momo
April 8th, 2009 7:11 amwow
Marcelo
April 16th, 2009 4:25 pmGosh! your template is really great, congratulations.
Greetings,
Marcelo
Lilith
April 21st, 2009 2:56 pmHello can you help me?
I had this template in my blogger and was WONDERFULL I love the template, but since 3 days ago something hapened because there is a lot of links and images from a photobucket and I had to change the blog. Know I have horrible template because when I put the template again comes this message :
Confirme a exclusão dos itens a seguir. Toda a configuração dos itens será perdida.
* HTML5
* Text2
* HTML3
* TextList1
* TextList2
* HTML2
* HTML4
* Text3
Is possible for you to help me?
Thank you
Yan
April 22nd, 2009 1:26 pmCould someone help me ? I downloaded the package but I can’t open it, could someone send me the HTML code ?
Thank’s !
jojo
April 23rd, 2009 8:51 amniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice
how can i put it in my free worspress
Balu
April 23rd, 2009 9:09 amHey,
first your Layout ist awesome. I’m using the Blogger-Version from allblogtools.com.
But I have the same problem as Lilith, with the photobucket-images instead of the original images.
Can you help?
Lilith
April 23rd, 2009 11:55 amYAN: I can send you by mail if you want, send me your mail
Katie
May 1st, 2009 12:55 amHi, just wanted to say thank you to all the people who left comments as to how to fix the Archives link so it would link to the archives page. I’ve been wondering how to do that, and now I have a fully functioning (albeit a little ugly!) archives page. :)
will
May 3rd, 2009 7:44 amnice theme.
evan eckard
May 3rd, 2009 3:11 pmHey All – I’m working on the next version of this theme for WordPress. There’s been a huge demand for an update, so I’m going to go ahead and make time to revamp some parts. Look for dynamic sidebars, advertising space, better page navigation, and any other bells & whistles I can come up with.
I’ll be forwarding the new files over to Smashing when ready. Thank you all so much for the theme popularity, and please feel free to comment with any additions/requests at my site evaneckard.com.
Thanks all!
Simon
June 26th, 2011 11:46 pmHave you done your work? I would really like to see what you changed ;-) Looking forward to it.
taylor
May 3rd, 2009 7:40 pmcan this theme be made into a plugin for “elgg”? i really like it!
Chris
May 4th, 2009 12:38 pmI would like to know if this theme is “widget ready”. I am new to configuring wordpress templates. I wanted to add some RSS feeds on the right and I am not sure how to do that without going to the “widgets” section and adding the feature there. I believe this template does not have right sidebar to add/modify/move widgets on the right??? Correct me if I am wrong.
- Humble Inquiry
Mugs
May 5th, 2009 10:23 pmbrilliant
ielienka
May 7th, 2009 6:49 ambrilliant, i love it … but my problem is that i’m under DRUPAL : any plan to port it to drupal 6 or 5 ? Does any one know any similar Drupal theme ? I’d really love to have it but i’m not good enough at theming to startch from scratch.
Please let me know.
Mona
May 8th, 2009 2:09 amThe theme was a little difficult to customize, but we found our way around it.
We changed the background colors a bit as well, to make it more neutral. You can check out the customized version here: http://blog.silkfair.com
Thanks
ruben
November 26th, 2009 1:43 pmHi can you tell me how you changed the background color on the notepad chaos theme? Please give me steps if possible
Thanks
rein
May 16th, 2009 10:09 amHi All, how to upload this theme into word press? thanks =)
wecostumizedweb
May 18th, 2009 8:53 amVery Nice thanks :)
Indr@
May 19th, 2009 9:10 pmwow cool I use it for my blog
Marilynne
May 22nd, 2009 7:02 pmI adore this theme. Thanks.
Chris Topher
May 27th, 2009 10:33 amI think these guys called it their own. Interesting…..
http://whitelabelgraphics.com/etsy-item-of-the-day/
BTW, i really love this theme!!
zenci
June 3rd, 2009 5:14 amsüper bir template çoook güzel tşk….
Tony
June 7th, 2009 2:10 pmWhen inserting a picture, it doesn’t recognize left, center or right align with word wrap. Anyone know how to fix this?
taufikmh
June 7th, 2009 10:43 pmtx very much
Joe
June 9th, 2009 1:17 pmHey! Great Theme! but anyone have any fix for “IE7″ alignment problem?
Test
June 12th, 2009 3:53 amDGFDGFD
Leena
June 12th, 2009 3:54 amAwesome theme… good job
JC
June 17th, 2009 11:34 pmLooks really cool. Excellentt job!
Marielle Garcia
June 25th, 2009 4:08 amHi. Could you do a widgetized version of this??
cerise
June 27th, 2009 9:42 ammerci
Daria
July 8th, 2009 3:21 pmFirst off, I love this theme! I have tried to download it and upload it onto my blog, but for some reason it isn’t showing up in my available WP Themes… I am wondering if there are any ‘hints’ that I am missing, or if the theme only works with certain versions of WordPress.
Any and all help is appreciated!
TheShip
July 9th, 2009 8:30 pmHi,
I have my movies blog already several months with this template, the only version I am aware of and I have gone through all this thread and still could not get an answer on:
1. How do I make this version theme, that I like a lot, more flexible so I can use widgets, plugins, etc,…
2. I have red that the new version is coming up and supporting this elementary stuff, Does anybody knows if is has already been released? where? = Location? I really dont want to change this template but it I need also functionality.
Thanks everyone for answering. :)
adi
July 14th, 2009 1:05 amthis is brilliant! really adorable
tane883
July 16th, 2009 6:41 pmOMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG I DID IT I DID ITI DID ITI DID ITI DID ITI DID ITI DID ITI DID ITI DID ITI DID ITI DID IT :) :) :) :D :D :D GUYS I MADE IT YEAAAHHHH!!!!!! ok i didn’t do it with the last link i gave…. but with something really EASY so EASY the logic bit me :)… ok this is what i did… i have a lot of themes of WordPress and i was playing with the codes of FUNCTION.PHP and the SIDEBAR.PHP for this theme. i was really disappointed because it wasn’t working the widget fix.. then i just drag and drop to the theme folder the file function.php and the sidebar.php FROM ANOTHER THEME.. then i refreshed the blog and there it was,,, the widgets :)
u can see my blog with the widgets. http://precious-ink.net/
if you need more help just email me ;) tane883@gmail.com
hugs n kisses from puerto rico :) remember Apple Rules!!!! XD
Cahya
July 24th, 2009 4:54 pmNice theme, I’ve try it, I just wish it could enable the gravatar icon view on the commenting section… :D
Nira Alves
July 27th, 2009 5:05 pmHey!
Hi!
The work is incredible, wonderful, thanks for sharing with us this theme!
I just change some minor things to adjust to that I need in my blog, but your theme is perfect! Beautiful! Beautiful!
SAINT
August 2nd, 2009 7:31 amlove it.. applied to my new webbie..modified it abit… but i’m having problems on the background color.. and also.. the alignment of the footer… arggh….
looks ok on windows.. but if u open my webbie with MAC.. OMG.. u could see the color difference… it’s soo obvious…..
will try again… will try again…
Evan
August 5th, 2009 12:30 pmNotepad Chaos has been updated. Feel free to download here: http://www.notepadchaos.com/?p=5
Cheryl
August 12th, 2009 4:34 pmComplete novice here…new to wordpress and adore this theme!!! Great for my classes…please tell me how to upload…not really clear on the instructions provided.
Thanks!
Emily
September 13th, 2009 7:37 pmHi, I’m new to WordPress, so I apologize if this is a dumb question, but…does this theme that supports sidebar widgets?
Thanks!Emily
Veronica
October 23rd, 2009 10:23 pmIt doesn’t look like it supports widgets :(
ranma
October 24th, 2009 5:31 pm303 comments and nobody seems to notice, that the style.css contains an error everywhere where serif fonts are used. there’s no “s” in the “serif” definition :) great theme anyway!
Alyssa
October 28th, 2009 7:53 pmLOVE this theme. Love it!
But I’m having problems with the latest 1.5 version that I’ve downloaded. My Archives page now contains my About Me information.
It is widget-aware now but they are not formatted to match the rest of the graphics of the theme so they look out of place.
Also, the tab at the bottom titled What Is This Place also pulls my About Me info as well. How do I edit that info???
Thanks for any help you can offer!
Alyssa
Murali
November 23rd, 2009 6:15 pmI have downloaded the theme and trying to activate. I am getting gray blank page and after that, if I activate the theme then white blank page is coming. I am using WP 2.6.3. Any Idea
Murali
November 23rd, 2009 7:51 pmTheme “notepad-chaos-version-2-0″ not working with WP 2.6.3. Any one faced same problem. Please guide me if any fix is there.
ruben
November 28th, 2009 11:36 pmLove this theme but need one thing and have no idea on how to do it. I want to change the page background to a different color I tried using plugin in WP but it does not change the entire background. Im new to this so please if someone know how to change the background color please give me a step by step.
Thanks You
Ruben
Noora
November 30th, 2009 12:56 pmlove love love this theme!!!
but am new to WP ( using .com) and have no idea how to get this as the theme on my blog…can anyone help??? please!
sarah
December 5th, 2009 8:12 amso cute theme…can i get one??
Jérémy Wanderscheid
December 6th, 2009 2:34 amHello,
I’m currently working on a french translation of this great theme, I will probably add some functions like dynamic sidebar.
My problem is the graphic files used for sidebar title, if I want to translated them I need to have the source files of these images to do a good and beautiful job. If someone can provide me these files I think my translated theme will be better.
Thanks in advance
Wendy Beresford
January 4th, 2010 8:22 pmGreat theme. only problem is when viewing with Internet Explorer 6. The yellow post-it for Recent Posts is broken. The top part of the Post-it displays correctly (with Recent Posts text), then there is a large gap, the length of Pages and Categories in column 2, before the bottom part of Recent Posts displays (containing links to posts) this looks bad.
See it here: http://www.wendyberesford.co.uk
Can anyone help please?
Bart Bruijnesteijn
February 19th, 2010 1:11 amYou should loose IE6, it gives problems with a lot of websites as it doesn’t adhere to standards, I know from professional experiences working with big corporate websites. If you want to stick with IE, go for the more recenter versions. But I should also consider better alternatives like Firefox