It’s been quite a while since the last time we released a free WordPress theme so we’re just as excited as you probably are now.

Leatherly is our way of saying ‘thanks’ to the amazing WordPress community. Wonderfully crafted by an Indonesian renowned web designer, Richard Fang, Leatherly is a free WordPress theme specifically created for those who want to benefit from the web on a brief one-page website. If you want to use the web to showcase your work and find leads and clients, Leatherly is definitely for you. Imagine a web page showing the latest post of your online journal, several photo shots of your favorite, a brief résumé showing your abilities/skills rating, and a contact form at the bottom of the page that intrigues people to get in touch with you and seal the deal. It’s simple yet packed with awesome details.

We can’t wait to show you this genius design, so here is a preview of the Leatherly Theme.

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Backbone is undergoing beta testing. Our Dev Team dedicate most of their working hours evaluating feedback from testers, calibrating and fine-tuning to ensure you will have the best WordPress experience possible. Now that the Beta has been going for more than a week we wanted to give you a bit of insight into how it went and what our next steps are.

The Objectives of the Beta Test

A beta test is the final stage in the testing of new software before its commercial release, and is conducted by testers other than its developers.

The Backbone Theme Framework is maybe the biggest project ever in ColorLabs & Company milestone. We have very high expectation for Backbone so we set the bar higher than ever this time. We want Backbone to have features that will greatly enhance people’s experience with WordPress. We want to release a successful product and a beta test is one of the best tools to accomplish that goal. It will help us to be more prepared for Backbone release and ensure its quality.

Private Beta Test and Why

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This is ColorLabs first guest post written by Kathleen Hubert, a blogger who writes on a variety of different sites. Check out more of her work at Car Loans.

WordPress themes from ColorLabs are perfect for holiday season blogging. Whether you are operating a commercial or affiliate marketing blog that will bring you extra cash during the holiday season rush, or whether your blog includes useful advice such as how to get the best rates on car loans, ColorLabs has a selection of themes that will add holiday spirit to your blog.

The Christmas season is a perfect time to update the look of your blog. Even if your blog does not get a Christmas rush of hits and new visitors, updating in time for the New Year ensures that you will be ready for new growth and new horizons in 2012. Of course, if your blog is a retail-oriented blog, you want to make sure that the legions of new and returning users who will visit your blog to enjoy everything you have to offer will be greeted with a fresh, clean, new look.

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On Friday, July 29, Gabriel Hutagalung went to Surabaya to visit 2 ColorLabs teams who were there, Mohammad Zulkarnain (@zulsdesign) and Edy Supangat (@edypang). The day coincided with the convening of FreShSby Gathering in July.

FreShSby, which is the acronym of the Freedom of Sharing Surabaya, is a community of creative industries from Surabaya, East Java, Indonesia, with mission. Each month they held a FreShSby gathering as an offline discussion media between the creative industries in Surabaya. Mohammad Zulkarnain is one of the initiators of this community.

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IDBYTE is the largest digital event in Indonesia. It is a week of engaging conferences, workshops and exhibitions. This year’s IDBYTE was held on July 11-14 at Ritz-Carlton, Pacific Place, Jakarta and also included the event of Bubu Awards V.07. Included in the IDBYTE series of events was a three-day workshop with several topics: mobile technology, social media, e-commerce and online measurement & analytics. IDBYTE 2011 (@idbyte) featured top global speakers in the digital industry, among others, such as Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, and eBay.

We sent our two best men, Rio and Anang, to attend the workshop on the second and third day. It was a rare and valuable opportunity for us to be able to obtain the latest information directly from the perpetrators of the world’s digital industry and there’s no way we’re going to miss the chance. Around 1000 people attended the three-day workshop. They consisted of various circles, but most were companies that deals with the digital world, so it’s a great opportunity for networking. Rio and Anang even had the chance to meet Shinta Dhanuwardoyo (@shintabubu), IDBYTE Chairwoman, in person.

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Finding the right people to work with is one of the elements that can make the difference between a mostly successful project and something really brilliant. We are proud to have such talented and motivated team at ColorLabs. In our mission to grow a tighter bond with you guys, ColorLabs themes users, we are going to show you how passionate everyone on the team is about the work they do.

This is the first of series of interviews to the ColorLabs team. Today I’m featuring Firman Firdaus, the man who designed SimpleReader, one of ColorLabs upcoming themes. Firman recently joined the ColorLabs team as a web designer. He provides visual designs (website mock-ups) for us to develop. He won the ColorLabs Design Contest in 2008 (with his winning theme: TypeMagz) and has been around in the world of blogging for so long.

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Ever since we first started ColorLabs, all of you have shown us that you love modifying our themes, ripping them apart and creating incredibly beautiful websites.

As part of our appreciation to you, we provide a special space for you to show off your work to the world. If  you are confident that your website is good-looking, functional, and well-coded, then it is the right place for your work. You just need to spend a few minutes on our showcase to see some incredible user-modified versions of our themes to understand what we mean.

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