Creating the logo for Deep Dives with Drew was probably the easiest part of designing the site. Getting the website itself to feel like me took more trial and error.
WordPress offered plenty of options, but many felt surprisingly similar. That experience helped connect the two readings: a platform can make publishing more accessible while still shaping how we express ourselves.
Making publishing accessible
In “WordPress: A Content Management System to Democratize Publishing”, Cabot (2018) explains how WordPress grew from a blogging platform into a flexible content management system. Themes help users change a website’s appearance, while plugins expand its functions. Its community of contributors helps make those tools available without requiring everyone to become a developer.
I appreciate that accessibility. Although I had used WordPress previously, I had not explored website building with it as deeply. Having templates gave me somewhere to start, even when the process did not always feel intuitive.
Plenty of options, familiar layouts
Adami (2018) takes a more critical perspective in “Styling the Self Online”. She argues that WordPress’s themes and design guidance favor a particular idea of professionalism, often expressed through clean, minimalist designs. Those preferences can encourage websites to look alike and make personal expression less visible.
That argument matched some of my experience. Many layouts felt almost formulaic. I understand that providing a repeatable structure is part of a template’s purpose, but even some “blog” templates felt less inviting than I expected. Others seemed better suited to a business than an interactive blog.
For Deep Dives with Drew, nostalgia guided my choices. The logo drew inspiration from color schemes common in the mid to late 1990s, when I was growing up. Its colors then shaped the rest of the site, and that nostalgic feeling helped me think about fonts and layouts.
The challenge was finding a template that supported that personality.
The right design depends on the purpose
I have also used Wix to build my professional portfolio. In that setting, modern, minimalist templates were beneficial because they helped showcase my work clearly. That experience makes me hesitant to treat minimalism itself as the problem.
What works for my professional portfolio does not necessarily create the feeling I want for Deep Dives with Drew. A personal blog should offer room for its creator’s personality, and more rigid templates can work against that goal.
Having more templates does not necessarily mean having more ways to express yourself.
I agree with Cabot that WordPress lowers barriers to publishing. I also agree with Adami’s concern that its design options can steer personal expression toward a shared style. For me, the question is whether I can adapt the template to the identity I already have in mind. The trial and error has been about finding that fit.
Further reading
Adami, E. (2018). Styling the self online: Semiotic technologization in weblog publishing. Social Semiotics, 28(5), 601–622. https://doi.org/10.1080/10350330.2018.1504713
Cabot, J. (2018). WordPress: A content management system to democratize publishing. IEEE Software, 35(3), 89–92. https://doi.org/10.1109/MS.2018.2141016
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