If you are looking for a clean, one page parallax theme to build a site on, look no further than Patti.
But before I elaborate, what is a parallax theme and what is it good for?
Parallax themes have been around for a couple of years, ever since the release of iOS 7 by Apple.
You’ve seen them: the whole site is viewable in one long scrolling page with photos floating behind text and other elements, like layers on a bed of pixels.
Wikipedia defines parallax as:
“a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different lines of sight, and is measured by the angle or semi-angle of inclination between those two lines.”
So when you scroll down a parallax site, it appears you are seeing things from different angles.
Pretty cool, eh? But then, it’s not for everyone.
Since a one page parallax theme emphasizes the front page, they’re not really great for sites with pages and pages of deep content. That’s why the term, “Parallax” is usually accompanied by “one page” in their descriptions.
The site I built with Patti was perfect for a one pager. The company is straightforward and simple. Columbia Water Wells is in the business of digging water wells. Not much to say there.
About Patti
For some reason, all the themes I like are sold on Themeforest. It’s kind of spooky.
What I liked immediately was Patti’s clean, elegant look, which is both modern and classic.
Installation was easy and included lots of demo content that I find unnecessary, but sometimes helpful.
Patti comes with the backend-frontend page builder, Visual Composer, which includes Templatera, a premium add on for easy page builder template management.
This backend page builder is quite intuitive and it functions without a hiccup. It’s basically like placing widgets all over the page.
For sections that are anchored with the menu, you can choose a template from among a list of default templates.
Then, you can Add Elements to place within the template, and each element comes with a settings box and editor, where html code can be added.
Each section can be broken into four columns, with the different elements placed within. There are separate settings for the Column, Row, and Element, making it easily customizable.
Even though Patti comes with Revolution Slider, I used the Image Gallery element to display three pictures as a slider and it works brilliantly. Since the pictures weren’t long enough, I had to add space on the sides in photoshop. Otherwise they’d be full width.
Custom posts include Portfolio, Services, Team, Testimonials, and Contact and these come with shortcodes to place on the home page.
Patti is pretty fast, and Columbiawaterwells.com loads in under 3 seconds. After smushing the images, Pagespeed Insights gives the desktop version 77/100 with all the usual comments, and 46/100 for mobile.
On a phone, the site looks beautiful. This is where the single pagey-ness really shines. The layout is super clean and font crystal clear. I love how it looks.
I know the support from developer Madalin of Delicious Themes is good since and he replied quickly to an email I didn’t even intend to send to him.
One page parallax view
I like Patti so much I feel like switching my Marikane.com site to it. If you need a one page parallax theme that’s easy to customize, I encourage you to give Patti a try.
What are your experience with one page parallax themes? Did they work for your project? What challenges did you have? I’d love to know.