template designer

morning

we are looking for a template designer for a new store my wife is working on...

its a bridal store online and bricks and mortor

can any desgners out there please contact me
thanks
lee
sales@rapid-rc.co.uk

Take a look at themeforest.com

Lot's of quality templates. (finding out-of-the-box opencart templates is an adventure).

However, once you get an idea for a design you can go from there with either a "designer" or "coder" to convert your template.

I was going to design my own template but realized that I could get a good template cheaper than the coffee it would take to produce one.

If you find a opencart theme either here at the extensions area or out in the wild, it's pretty easy to install!

I'm in the process of converting one to opencart and html5 at the moment.

PS: Bridal shops are fun to do! I always enjoy stopping by my clients shop in town.
I changed the checkout for my client to be a wishlist type since they really wanted to work on the up-sell.

thanks so much for the advice

Post back when you have problems or pm me if you want

Cheers!

SapporoGuy wrote:Take a look at themeforest.com

Lot's of quality templates. (finding out-of-the-box opencart templates is an adventure).

However, once you get an idea for a design you can go from there with either a "designer" or "coder" to convert your template.

I was going to design my own template but realized that I could get a good template cheaper than the coffee it would take to produce one.

If you find a opencart theme either here at the extensions area or out in the wild, it's pretty easy to install!

I'm in the process of converting one to opencart and html5 at the moment.

PS: Bridal shops are fun to do! I always enjoy stopping by my clients shop in town.
I changed the checkout for my client to be a wishlist type since they really wanted to work on the up-sell.

When we talk shop templates, I can not see the logic in not getting a unique design, like not seen before, rather than one that perhaps 100 have been in and see? by downloading a template, it also restricts the webshop from the start, because the template may not be aware of the wishes holder. It is strongly recommended to find a designer who is talented enough to fulfill your wishes or demands.

/Delta

@ why ...
I tend to suggest to look around and get a feel for what you want.
Or, I would profile the client to get a better understanding of what they are looking for.
The above depends on budget, goals and such.

In my current situation, I have trouble coming up with concepts for myself. wall of white ...
Strange that I don't normally have that problem with clients.

Anyway, I spent days and hours cleaning up opencart's templates and putting in a design that I wasn't satisfied.
I found themeforest the other day by accident even though, I have been to nuttuts several times.
I came up with a concept within 10 minutes. I really don't even like it! BUT it grabbed my socks and I knew that this was what that site needed.
My other site took a bit more time about 3 hours of going through almost all of the templates and that was the site that I knew what I wanted, but ended up going with an older concept from 3 years ago.

So, I do agree that a "for sale, free" template does not know what you want. But sometimes you don't either or even if you do, you didn't know that you wanted something else.

@ letting a designer go at it ... (a bad experience)
When I built the bridal shop site I mentioned above, I had thrown together a concept, basic design, colors, storyboard, layout and had a designer come in and decide that they knew better. I ended up putting the design on and I'm embarrassed to even list it in my portfolio. That shop had "supposed" talent and skill.

So, after a few bad experiences like that I now tend to tell people to "check out" what's on the net. They can always go from there knowing that they can ask for a designer and/or coder to assist them in their needs.

@ unique design ...
Interesting point. I don't know what you have produced but a shopping cart is to some extent limited in layout and design. Xsecrets did post a link to site that was pretty radical but that is one of the rare ones I have seen. Even 37signals (founders of Ruby on Rails) used to do excellent and exciting work but then everybody copied them in some for or another... unique.

Or you go the other way and make it so unique, nobody can figure it out.

However, if you are talking about the other unique that is based off the client's profile then, obviously, I am in all agreement.

I'd be interested to see what you feel is unique since I could obviously be wrong in my thoughts.

It is always best to have a website custom made for your brand, not to use a template (and I say this as a person who sells items/templates on the Envato marketplaces).

However, after working with and for several small businesses, I know not everyone has the budget to hire a web designer to make a storefront from scratch. So if you're looking to save money, Themeforest is great, but I would always recommend paying someone to have it customized to fit your company and brand. There are few OpenCart templates on there currently, but their are a ton of HTML/CSS templates.

Honestly, anytime someone has wanted me to customize a theme for them, I end up mostly re-building it. So I guess you could really argue if thats time/cost effective anyways

I like your response and interest.
I let this issue remain as it is and therefore write to you privately.
Not to keep anyone out, but just to keep the thread straight.

Yep, I'm rebuilding that landing page at this very moment
However, I'm getting a chance to use a boilerplate for html5, learning html5 and will this time around use 960 instead of blueprint for the sake of learning that system too.

@ custom brand
Could you explain a little more about that?
I'm having trouble understanding that concept since I've seen so many sites that are basically the same concept outside of specialized images that people have thrown in.

Well said

Delta-DK wrote:

SapporoGuy wrote:Take a look at themeforest.com

Lot's of quality templates. (finding out-of-the-box opencart templates is an adventure).

However, once you get an idea for a design you can go from there with either a "designer" or "coder" to convert your template.

I was going to design my own template but realized that I could get a good template cheaper than the coffee it would take to produce one.

If you find a opencart theme either here at the extensions area or out in the wild, it's pretty easy to install!

I'm in the process of converting one to opencart and html5 at the moment.

PS: Bridal shops are fun to do! I always enjoy stopping by my clients shop in town.
I changed the checkout for my client to be a wishlist type since they really wanted to work on the up-sell.

When we talk shop templates, I can not see the logic in not getting a unique design, like not seen before, rather than one that perhaps 100 have been in and see? by downloading a template, it also restricts the webshop from the start, because the template may not be aware of the wishes holder. It is strongly recommended to find a designer who is talented enough to fulfill your wishes or demands.

/Delta

SapporoGuy wrote: @ custom brand
Could you explain a little more about that?
I'm having trouble understanding that concept since I've seen so many sites that are basically the same concept outside of specialized images that people have thrown in.

By customizing towards your brand, I mean you shouldn't be using the default theme to sell, say, natural organic muffins. Often you see people using whatever template they can find that doesn't even match their product, or their branding. Which is bad!

@ hbuchel
I'm totally in agreement with that!
Which is why I asked for paid help to brand my site.