Hot on the heels of its sister, Pearl, we're so excited to introduce to our latest theme, Hayes! Hayes was named after one of our co-founder Victoria's favorite neighborhoods in San Francisco, where she's based. Like its namesake, Hayes has a grown-up cool vibe that feels both elegant and modern. She's a little artsy, a little editorial, but super, super functional.
Just like with Pearl, Hayes includes our brand new Color Options and Font Options tabs built directly into the Customizer, so you can adjust color and font site wide without any extra plugins or code (pro tip: be sure to bookmark the Google Fonts web page to pick your favorite fonts—their selection can be overwhelming, so it's good to come ready with your selections!).
Hayes has so many layout variations, we've created a whopping SIX demos to show you everything she can do. Check them all out here:
Demo 1 | Demo 2 | Demo 3 | Demo 4 | Demo 5 | Demo 6
And below, we're sharing our fave theme features with you. We can't wait to hear what you think!
A Gorgeous Featured Post Option // Hayes' Featured Post can be turned on or off, allowing you to easily customize the flow of posts greeting your readers. The design has an editable colored background, which helps the content stand out and look sharp. Integrate our Shop the Post plugin and feature the affiliate widgets of your choice. Plus, our new Featured Post Links menu allows you to add customizable buttons directly beneath your featured post, to engage readers with pages and platforms that are important to you.
We added “The Presidio Layout” // One of the most common feature requests we receive is for users to add Presidio's “large” post feed layout to our other themes. You've told us you love having the option to feature a larger blog post image, with post summaries stacked underneath the image, versus to the side. You asked, and we listened! New in Hayes, we've added the option to apply a “Classic (Large)” layout to any of the Home Page feeds. So, if old school is more your thing, you can make Hayes look like a classic, traditional blog.
NEW! Meet our Social Feed Widget // Current customers may have heard about the recent changes with Instagram which prevent many plugins from pulling data (including images) from their site—hence, many WordPress Instagram feeds stopped working. We're addressing this for the long term by releasing Social Feed, a new widget which will come packaged with all of our themes (and which will soon be released as an update to older themes, too!). With Social Feed, you can manually upload your favorite images in an edge-to-edge feed. Link each image to wherever you choose. Or, get creative (like we did above!) and leverage the image slots to feature products readers are always asking you about. Worried that you NEED an auto-feed of your latest ‘grams? We're not so sure. Read more about why we created Social Feed here.
NEW! Introducing the Featured Post widget // Most of our themes are already packaged with a similarly named Featured Posts widget, but the new Featured Post (singular!) widget has a fresh new layout and extra controls to help you highlight standout content. Viewable above — it's the widget of the gal taking a bath with the “5 Easy Ways to Practice Self Care” post title to the right — the widget is a wide, horizontal layout perfect for our interstitials. You can change the label attached to the content (great for writing copy like “Popular,” or “Trending,” or “Most Discussed”). Set the Featured Post widget to feed in a specific post, or posts from a chosen category or tag. You can also change the “offset,” i.e., how many posts an auto-feed should skip, which prevents duplicate content on your Home Page.
NEW! Sub-headline feature // Hayes' Grid Feed layout includes a sub-headline feature, which also appears underneath post titles on the Single Post Page. Whether you're using WordPress's Gutenberg block editor, or the Classic post editor, you'll find the sub-headline field on the right side of your blog post editor. We love using sub-headlines to add more context to your post title (which can encourage users to click in!); they also give more personality to your brand voice, since they're a small snippet of additional commentary on the content you're offering to readers!
FOUR feed layouts on the Home Page! // Hayes features an incredible four different post feed layouts you can mix and match on your Home Page, creating a truly customized experience.
- Our Classic layout features smaller post thumbnails with summaries to the right, and an optional sidebar to the right or left. View it here, beginning with the post titled “How I Curl My Hair.”
- Our Classic (Large) layout features bigger featured images, with post titles atop the image and summaries beneath (again, you can add a sidebar to the right or left, too!). View it here, beginning with the first post on the Home Page, titled “5 New Makeup Trends to Try.”
- Our Grid Feed layout features even columns of content, with rectangular thumbnails, and post and sub-headline below (plus, integration with our Shop the Post plugin, too!). Of note is that Grid can work in a 2-column or 3-column design, with the ability to add up to 8 posts total. View it here, beginning with the post titled “Real Talk Friday.”
- Finally, Hayes features a Featured Post layout, which mimics the dedicated Featured Post at the top. View it here, beginning with the post titled “How I Started My Blog.” We love how a Home Page with primarily Featured Post layouts kinda feels like a grown up Miramar!
Keep your branding alive! // New in Hayes, we've created space for you to add your site logo to the footer, with right and left menus flanking it. Use our built in Customizer controls to simply type in your site name, or upload your own artwork and resize directly in the Customizer!
Whew, are you excited yet? We are so thrilled with all the new features Hayes has to offer, and hope you love it as much as we do! Be sure to check out all the Hayes theme demos, and comment below with any questions!
