Julie Cloutier is a Web/Graphic designer with 15 years of experience. She founded JC design in 2004. Since 2011, she has been building WordPress websites using the Thesis theme. Aside from her work, she has a passion for trail running.
Follow @jcloutierdesign on Twitter.
Julie will be of panel titled “How To Get Started Building Custom Websites with WordPress“.
What is your favorite improvement to WordPress this past year?
The automatic update, I don’t know if it has been a year since it was implemented but I love this feature.
Why did you decide to speak at WordCamp Montreal?
When I started with WordPress I had trouble finding out how to create a custom design website with WordPress. I wish there had been more information about it then so I thought our panel of speakers could be very useful for a lot of people.
What is your talk going to be about?
How to create a custom design in WordPress using the Thesis theme Framework. I will be part of a panel of four designers and each of us is going to talk about its method of choice. Our method are all different, so anyone attending should find something they like.
What is the one thing you want people to walk away with from your talk?
A clear idea of what Thesis is all about and how it can help create custom design with WordPress. A desire to learn more about it and/or try it out.
Who in the WordPress community inspires you? Who do you follow?
Some of the most active people in the Montreal WordPress community and speakers at WordCamp’s like Kathryn Presner, Alexandre Simard, Brendan Sera-Shriar and Christine Rondeau. Some teachers from Lynda.com like Morten Rand-Hendriksen (which is actually a speaker here at the 2014 WordCamp) and Chris Coyier.
What new feature would you like to see in the future?
I would like to see improvement on how WordPress handles bilingual websites. I still feel it is a bit too complicated. It’s not that complicated to install a multi-site (which is my preferred choice for building bilingual WordPress website’s) but I sometimes run into troubles with themes updates and/or plugins compatibility because of the usage of the multi-site functionality. In my opinion, when someone is just starting out with WordPress, the multi-site install is a bit too hard to do. I wish there was a one-click install for making a site bilingual and a “core” function to add the bilingual navigation in the navigation menu instead of having to use a plugin. Although the plugin I use is working very well. I use the Multisite Language Switcher by realloc.
