This is a new project I'm starting on. It's a wordpress theme for tradesmen to showcase their work. It's based on the hitchcock theme but has a lot more flexibility.

The original demo: https://portfolio.aerin.co.uk/

Same but without the background: http://tradesman-theme.co.uk/

How it could be used by a landscaper/gardener: http://gardener.tradesman-theme.co.uk/

Whilst a lot of people like it, others have said it looks amatuerish/plain. Suggestions please

As an aside, I ran a quick usabilityhub test. A bit of a mixed bag of answers (especially from those who didn't read the questions): https://usabilityhub.com/tests/785e59c7fe20/results/973d475f50db

Using the gardening example:

1. On a larger screen (1920x1080) the grid of services seems to be rather large. Maybe have a sidebar or have a fixed width?
2. When clicking on an image of a service it would be good to go to the post rather then having to click the title.
3. IMO there is too much transparency in places, sometimes a solid background color can be easier to read.
4. The title is hard to read (green text on a green background)
5. When viewing a service i would remove the "< {Prev Post Name}" "{Next Post} >" links and maybe replace them with a "Other Services" section.

All good points.

1. I no longer use sidebars because most people now use tablets or phones for browsing at home. If you look at the site on a tablet it all fits much better (or just narrow your browser to see the same). I can fix the width on larger screens. 1280px seems to be a reasonable width.

2. I did make the image clickable but it was too easy to 'touch' by mistake. I can put it back.

3. Agree about the transparency. This is really just experimentation.

4. Agreed (but again this is just a demo)

5. OK. I get what you mean but this lets people move to the next project. What I can do to help is add category buttons (with images?) to help with navigation.  Or maybe the tradesman will want the categories in the main menu...

Anyway, thanks for the review

1. Desktops still account for 44% of the web traffic so IMO its still well worth supporting. People are supporting IE with an ever lower usage.
2. I can see it would be easy to do this on mobile but on desktop it should be fine, I never had any issues and I was using a trackpad.
3. --
4. -- 
5. Maybe what the tradesmen will need one category for services and another for past projects. 

1. I agree that there are still a lot of people using desktops but at hope on the sofa, people looking for a builder, gardener, roofer, plumber etc use tablets far more than they use a desktop/laptop. However, you are correct, I need a max width for larger screens.

2. Done

5. Most tradesmen I built sites for want categories for each service. They can then add posts for each one. for example, plumbers want kitchens, bathrooms, wetrooms, boilers install etc. Some want them categorised by location (for local SEO). But I get your point. I'll leave it open so they can do whatever they want.

I agree that the images should be clickable and not just the titles.

I like the gardening example. I think the main background with any theme needs to be a subtle balance, so it doesn't minimize the visual allure of the clickable images.

A home button wouldn't go amiss. Not everyone thinks to click the main title to go back to where they started. (On the other examples, the menu options needs to be brought over to the right like in the first example.)

I will always stick with my desktop. I sometimes use a Surface tablet at work (not mine), and I have a smartphone (Note 8), but I love the desktop way more. Truth be told, I get eye ache when I use mobile devices. (maybe I just need glasses).

Some people might comment that it's amateurish, but that's because you are usually function over form first, and maybe people don't know that you are very experienced at this. Also, when viewed on a desktop, the images are indeed fairly large, compared to many sites. (YouTube thumbnails for example.)

Anyway, it's good. I wanted to slag it off like you often slag people off, but alas, I couldn't find much miserable stuff to say.

Thanks Grant,

The theme is still being developed so all suggestions are welcome.

There are now home links (I just for got to add them to the menu), the images are clickable and there is an 1100px width limit.

There are many cases where a website needs to be pretty - wedding, fashion and lifestyle sitres for example. There are other sites that can get away with being 'ugly'.  Amazon won't win any design awards but it's functional design is highly optimised.

A friend who worked recently for eBay said their stats showed nearly 60% of visits were on tablets, 20% on phone and only 20% used other devices (like a desktop). Facebook has 95% smartphone usage. And over 60% use their phones/tablets daily for search which the same number will then see your website on that same device. Many of these people will then use other devices to access the Internet but it's that initial visit that counts.

I don't mind a slagging off. As long as I know what you don't like. On another forum the comment was 'it looks amateurish'. When pressed on what needed fixing the reply was 'if you can't see what's wrong you need to hire a designer'. All of which was no help at all.

depending on the trade and the urgency, many tradespeople  - (guess we can't say tradesmen any more when there have  always been women working in those roles ) - like to have their emergency/24h or normal contact number as first thing at the very top of the  site, especically on mobile: think burst pipe and you find a plumber's site - you want the "burst pipe water everywhere? call this number ..."  as well as location or area covered - no good finding a great plumber if they have to travel half the length of the country 

also a good idea to have a place for accreditations - possibly the footer - i.e. CORGI registered and all that kind of thing

beans on toast (first category) needs some grated cheese

Beans on toast with Worcestershire Sauce for me.

The tagline is the one set in the wordpress settings - so it can include a phone number. I could also add a new 'tagline2' option in the customiser for a second line of information.

The latest version of wordpress has an image widget so you can add images to widget areas (duh!). But I could add a 'accreditation' widget to add and automatically resize multiple images.

Great suggestions, thanks.

The backgrounds have now gone (but are still an option) and the CSS now removes the transparencies unless there is a background.

This is the core theme:

http://tradesman-theme.co.uk/

Look past the lack of colours (this is just a demo) and tell me if it has all the right elements in place. In particular, look at the odrer of things towards the bottom of this page: http://tradesman-theme.co.uk/page-with-comments/ I think the actual comments should go higher on the page but none of the ways I've tried really work. Or maybe I'm too close to the design and can't see the woods for the trees.

An example of how it could work for a gardener:

http://gardener.tradesman-theme.co.uk/

Note the new features to display contact info in the header and main menu.

The same but with a background:

http://backgrounds.tradesman-theme.co.uk/

Really nice theme. I love the colour scheme