If you do web design or development of WordPress websites – most likely you check out the competition from time to time (for inspiration alone). You might even network with some of these people at WordPress meetups or WordCamps in your area. We’ve written about 70 blog posts in the last few months, and got to thinking about the fact that they mostly in the “tips and tricks” genre. We made the decision here in the office to branch out a bit and find out more about what people are actually doing out there with WordPress within their business, and for client work in different markets.

Los Angeles WordPress developers

In this post we’re going to feature 5 different Los Angeles WordPress developers (and designers) you should be following. Why? We thought it would be neat to connect with people in sunny Southern CA because of the diversity of the area (and types of clients they might be working with). I mean come on – California, Hollywood, Los Angeles – they have to be creating some cool stuff there with WordPress, right? I hope you enjoy this article as much as we liked putting it together. We also think you’ll find how different (and yet how similar) people who create websites with WordPress are. You’re not only only going to view some very cool examples of WP websites, but the developers behind them have varying types of experience.

Let’s get started!

John Lee – Keebs.com

This is the portfolio website of Los Angeles WordPress developer John Lee (or ‘Keebs’). How many business / portfolio websites have you seen that were blog or slider style in the last year? The masterful thing about the Keebs.com layout the thing that’s in the forefront is the portfolio of work (and NOT text). Then you move your mouse around over the individual images and get the details on mouseover (which is really cool as well). It’s just enough information how and where you need it.

We definitely thought based on his non-traditional portfolio website his interview responses would be interesting (and we were right).

Here’s a brief introduction to John Lee and his WordPress work:

I work as a freelancer full-time mostly on the WP platform. I specialize in design, coding, and illustration. I started out strictly as an illustrator creating album covers, t-shirt designs, and flyers for bands/artists. Then, I learned CSS, JavaScript, and some PHP and started incorporating my illustrations into my web work. People often ask me about the name of my company. Keebs (stems from Keebler) is actually a nickname I grew up with and what my friends still call me today haha.

The Interview

We asked them a few questions about their work and WordPress in a mini-interview, and this is what they had to say:

How long have you been using WordPress? I’ve been using WP and doing client work on the platform for about 5-6 years now.
Do you work alone or with others (inside your company or out)? I normally work alone. Sometimes, I hire outside help if I need some type of functionality coded in that is out of my area.
What are your favorite free WordPress plugins? Contact Form 7, Google XML Sitemaps, Jetpack, W3 Total Cache, Database Backup, Login Lockdown.
Do you have any favorite premium plugins? Tubepress Pro and Gravity Forms
Do you use premium themes with clients, or custom create your own (or both)? I custom create my own themes.
Have you ever contributed to the official WordPress.org support forums?
Yes, I have. Both as a helper and student. I love the WP community both on the official site and Stack Overflow.
Do you sell your own themes / plugins – have you ever put anything in the WP.org free repositories? No, although I have plans to sell themes later on down the line.
What is the “typical” WordPress client for you – describe the average project or website? I work a lot with YouTubers as most of them need a web presence outside of their YouTube profile. Usually, they ask for a place where their fans and subscribers can go to learn more about the video author. This usually includes an archive of their videos, a blog, links to their other social network profiles, and maybe something that fans can only get by visiting their website.

Here’s 3 examples of John’s WordPress website work from his project portfolio:

http://mysteryguitarman.com

Fred Figglehorn

http://davedays.com (currently being updated)

If you’re looking for some distinctive layout examples, especially of WordPress themes more video based – you’ll find those examples very refreshing. John does a lot of work for popular YouTube channels, as you can see in the 3 examples above.

If you’d like to follow John Lee – you can find him:
website: Keebs.com
Twitter: @LAKeebs
Instagram: @LAKeebs

Kristin Falkner

Kristin Falkner’s homepage says “I make magic happen with WordPress”, and she couldn’t be closer to the truth. We were struck by a few things right away after viewing her homepage. One was the fact that the entire page was “above the fold” (no scrolling). How often do you see that? She pulls it off well, as here homepage tells immediately exactly what she does in both images and text, with examples of work, previous clients, logo and navigation – ALL above the fold! We also love the contrast of the black and grey to the blue, everything is just so easy to read, and easy on the eyes.

Here’s what Kristin says about her work as a WordPress developer:

My name is Kristin Falkner and I’m a freelance web developer who specializes in WordPress. I’ve had the opportunity to work on projects for some amazing companies like Sony, TOMS, Toyota, MoMA and others. My work has also been featured in the WordPress Showcase. I primarily do custom theme development but I also will do some theme modification projects and some other random web-related things like Facebook tabs, XHTML/CSS coding or email coding. I’m completely self-taught as a web developer and I started building websites professionally at the age of 16 and have continued ever since. My absolutely favorite thing about working in this industry is you’re never done learning.

We asked Kristin a few questions in a mini-interview, and these were her responses:

How long have you been using WordPress? I’ve been working with WordPress for close to three years and I’ve done general web development for over 10.
How long have you been doing client work with WordPress? About two and a half years. Now, WordPress-related projects are about 98% of what I do.
Do you do design / coding – or both? I can do both but I prefer to just code. I’d be perfectly content if I never designed another website, but it’s a useful skill to have for those clients who want one person to handle their whole project. I love the coding process, though. I love the challenge of coding something I’ve never done before. I have a lot of fun developing themes as I am a total nerd.
For either, do you work alone or with others (inside your company or out)? I’m almost always working out of my home office but I do have relationships with several agencies to where I may be interfacing with a designer or project manager on a specific project. For development, I usually am always working by myself and preferably so. I think everyone codes a bit differently so I find it easier to be working within my own code. It’s part of the reason why I also prefer custom theme development versus modifying an existing theme or working off a framework. Those often have some level of time where you’re just trying to figure out how the original developer approached the theme.
What are your favorite free WordPress plugins? I love Magic Fields. I do a lot of entertainment-related sites and I think GigPress is a really solid event calendar. Google XML Sitemaps is great for SEO. NextGen is nice for basic galleries.
Do you have favorite premium plugins? Hands down, Gravity Forms. Their developer license is absolutely worth it. I find coding forms really tedious so I love that I rarely have to do it anymore and I’ve done some incredible things with that plug-in and its add-ons. It’s awesome.
Do you use premium themes with clients, or custom create your own (or both)? I mostly do custom themes that I create from a modified version of Starkers that I’ve tweaked to be a great starting point that works for me. I’ve done theme modification projects, though. Usually, if someone approaches me and they have a small budget, I point them in that direction.
Have you ever contributed to the official WordPress.org support forums? I used to be on there but I haven’t been in a long time. It’s one of those things that I’d love to be more active on, I just need to find more time for it.
Do you sell your own themes / plugins – have you ever put anything in the WP.org free repositories? I’m in the process of creating my first theme for the masses. I usually am doing one-off themes built specifically for a certain project. Developing this theme is just something that’s taken much longer than I had hoped as I have to tackle it in my spare time, which I’m not finding very much of these days.
If you could specifically request something be included in the next release of WordPress – what would it be? I really don’t have anything I can think of that I’m specifically hoping for but it’s always great to see their new features.
If you could magically have a plugin developed to do anything you want for free – what features would you ask for? Is there a plug-in that freezes time and gives you more hours in the day out there? That would be awesome to have.
What is the “typical” WordPress client for you – describe the average project or website? Lately, I’ve seen a lot of PSD to WordPress projects, which is my absolute favorite thing to do. I used to do a lot of musician websites but I’ve since broken out of that a bit. I always like when someone contacts me about something I haven’t done yet. Recently, I worked with a wedding photographer which was a lot of fun because I hadn’t really worked on a photography site yet. I love the variety of it all.
Please provide examples if 2-3 of your best projects (with images) if you’d like your work featured in the post
What’s your rate for development work? I actually always prefer project rates to hourly. I just always like flat fees, but definitely make sure that I have a contract to protect against scope creep.
Do you attend or speak at any WordPress meetups or WordCamps (and if so which ones?) I’ve spoken at WordCamp LA twice and I am speaking at WordCamp Kansas City in June (I am from that area originally)
Where can people find you online (other than your website), social media, etc.? I have a (rarely updated) Twitter account @KristinCodesWP
Any closing remarks about WordPress or yourself we didn’t cover you might want to get out there? WordPress is awesome and I have so much fun working with it. I’m always learning something new or picking up a more efficient way to go about doing something within it. I hope to continue to grow along with it and can’t wait to see where it goes from here. I’m definitely enjoying the ride!

Here are 3 examples of Kristin’s work from her portfolio:

TriLion Studios

This is a recent PSD to WordPress project I did with an agency that I’ve started working with in the Midwest. I really like the design and I got to do some fun slideshow stuff in their Work section. I love working with awesome-looking PSDs.

Swrve.us

This is another PSD to WordPress project. The homepage slider is probably my favorite with the “Shop This Look” tab. I also themed Shopify for it to match to WP which was a challenge.

Justin Guarini

This is the theme that I get the most responses about via email by far. People always want to buy this theme and understandably I don’t sell any that I’ve created specifically for someone as that wouldn’t be fair to my client. I think maybe people are drawn to it because it doesn’t look like a WordPress site at all.

JustinGuarini

We wouldn’t call Kristin’s web design style “minimalistic” – rather we’d call it “smart”. You can see in her 3 examples above a running theme of showing the visitor only what they need to see with enough options to move forward, while showing exactly what the site is about in mere seconds. Add to that great use of images, whitespace, and typography and you have a great recipe for success!

Behla Design

Andrew Behla is a Los Angeles WordPress developer with more than 20 years experience in print and web design. Besides design and development, he also specializes in WordPress training and consultation. Everyone who creates WordPress websites bring different skill sets to the table. What we noticed with the BehlaDesign.com website was the careful placement of text and keywords. This easily conveys to the reader what they need to know, but more importantly gives the search crawlers what they need to know to index the website properly for appropriate keywords. Too often WordPress developers don’t know anything about SEO (or overdo it).

We asked Andrew a few questions about his work with WordPress websites, and this is what he had to say:

How long have you been using WordPress? 8 years
How long have you been doing client work with WordPress? 8 years
Do you do design / coding – or both? Both
For either, do you work alone or with others (inside your company or out)? I work with a team of developers that I’ve cultivated a strong relationship with and scale up or scale down based on the project needs.
What are your favorite free WordPress plugins? WordPress SEO Joost deValk, Woo Commerce, Contact Form 7, ShareThis, Woo Dojo, JetPack, Jquery Colorbox, Nextgen Gallery, JW Player (Longtail HTML5 video playlist), Media element html5 video and audio player
Do you have favorite premium plugins? Woo Commerce Add ons, Gravity Forms, S2 Member, Backup Buddy, Shopp
Do you use premium themes with clients, or custom create your own (or both)? Both. I love woo themes and use canvas as a framework. From there I design and develop custom “child” theme with the woo themes framework.
Have you ever contributed to the official WordPress.org support forums? Yes.
Do you sell your own themes / plugins – have you ever put anything in the WP.org free repositories? Not Yet!
If you could specifically request something be included in the next release of WordPress – what would it be? HTML5 Player integration and better User Interface for touch screens
If you could magically have a plugin developed to do anything you want for free – what features would you ask for? A more user friendly HTML Video Player with Playlists
What is the “typical” WordPress client for you – describe the average project or website? My clients range from small to medium size businesses up to corporations. I also work with artists and musicians. Anyone who needs a site is my typical client, and I am willing to work with clients at whatever level they wish to use wordpress.
What’s your rate: $85/hr
Do you attend or speak at any WordPress meetups or WordCamps (and if so which ones?) Yes, as many as I can! Los Angeles, Orange County, Las Vegas, San Franciso, San Diego
Where can people find you online (other than your website), social media, etc.? @behladesign on twitter

Here’s some examples of Behla Design’s WordPress development work:

http://andysummers.com

Custom WordPress design and development

http://dailycapital.com

Custom WordPress design and development

http://goldenearth.net

Custom WordPress e-commerce solution and Shopp integration

Any closing remarks about WordPress or yourself we didn’t cover you might want to get out there?

Andrew Behla founded Behla Design, Graphic Design & Web Development in 2000 by. Andrew has worked in the graphic design, web development, and print design for over twenty years and he has passed on his industry knowledge as a teacher at Santa Monica College and UCLA Extension where he was named Outstanding Instructor of the Year.

Andrew’s degrees in Philosophy and Business from Trinity University have given him the know-how both to run asuccessful Los Angeles graphic design and web development business and to cultivate meaningful relationships with his customers. His experiences as a teacher come out in everything he does and Andrew is always thrilled to pass along his expertise to his clients and his team.

www.Jenndelafuente.com

Jenn calls herself a “WordPress evangelist” (and it shows). As someone who’s been using WP since version 1.x – she can probably remember back when it had a “hacks” file (before plugins existed).

Here’s a brief overview of Jenn’s work:

Rosebud Designs is part one-woman wrecking crew and part always willing collaborative partner. I’m the principal and the main designer and developer. My bread and butter is custom WordPress sites. My philosophy is to build a site that’s not only great-looking and functions well, but is also easy for the consumer to use and easy for the owner to update and understand how to use.

I often collaborate with other designers and agencies to create kickass websites. I do plenty of consulting along the way, especially when people aren’t sure what WordPress is capable of doing (I like to call this the “possible or not possible” test). As my website says, I also work with “designers who love to design but don’t know a lick of code or are afraid of code.” I’ve long worked both sides of the fence, as a designer and a developer, so I mesh knowing hard-core programming with keeping true to the design the designer came up with. So when someone says “But no, I really want 12 pixels of space there!” or is really nitpicky about how the front end has been coded up, I completely understand and won’t think you’re too nuts.

I offer consultation, advice and also do both front end (HTML/CSS) and backend WordPress programming.

When we put Jenn through the paces of our WordPress mini-interview, she had some great responses:

How long have you been using WordPress? I remember when WordPress was at version 1.7. I can’t even remember how long ago that was.
How long have you been doing client work with WordPress? Since about 2008. It still amazes me how much WordPress has changed and evolved over the years.
Do you do design / coding – or both? Both, though most of the work I do is on the development side lately. I collaborate with a lot of designers and quite enjoy it.
For either, do you work alone or with others (inside your company or out)? I work with others on most of my projects. Many designers bring their projects to me. I really do like the collaborative spirit, and it helps push me on both the technical end — when people want to know if certain features are possible — and the design end. It’s hard not to be inspired by the amazing designs that come by my desk!
What are your favorite free WordPress plugins? Advanced Custom Fields is one of my favorites. I have no idea how I lived without it so long.
Do you have favorite premium plugins? Gravity Forms is my go-to for a lot of things. I also use the Gold Cart version of WP E-commerce for most of my WordPress/e-commerce mashups.
Do you use premium themes with clients, or custom create your own (or both)? I custom create my own themes for everyone. Lately, I’ve been using the Boilerplate HTML5 theme as a base and creating a custom theme from there.
Since everyone’s site is unique in both form and function, I train all my clients and write them a manual. Again, my goal is that the client have control over the content they need to change and be able to use their site easily.
If you could specifically request something be included in the next release of WordPress – what would it be? I really wish there was a better way of organizing the Media section. Maybe a folder system or something. Sometimes this gets super unwieldy.
What is the “typical” WordPress client for you – describe the average project or website? Because I work with a wide range of collaborators — from other fellow small firms to big agencies — my clients also cover a wide range. Typically, I work with a lot of small businesses and sole proprietors. Many of my clients are fellow creatives — they’re mom and pop shops, some of whom make handmade goods, they’re photographers looking for an awesome-looking portfolio, they’re local businesses, they’re fellow designers.
Do you attend or speak at any WordPress meetups or WordCamps (and if so which ones?) I have not spoken at a meetup or WordCamp (I’d love to someday), but when I lived in Sacramento, I did use to co-teach WordPress workshops and do some private tutoring and training for fellow designers.
Where can people find you online (other than your website), social media, etc.? My portfolio is at jenndelafuente.com. I (sometimes) maintain a blog at dabblingindesign.com.
You can always find me on Twitter at twitter.com/dabblingdesign or on Facebook at facebook.com/rosebuddesigns.
Any closing remarks about WordPress or yourself we didn’t cover you might want to get out there? I’ve been a WordPress evangelist for a long time. It’s hands down my favorite platform to develop on, and I still learn so much about it every time I dive into a project. It’s come a long way, and I think it’s capable of so much that people aren’t aware of. It delights me every time I consult with someone and work with someone and we come up with a great site that everyone is happy with.

Here are some examples of Jenn’s WordPress website project work:

www.jessicanicosia.com

www.paperandcake.com

Design by my good friend Christine McClain, I did all the WordPress work and the front-end work (HTML/CSS)

www.ssi-plastics.com

Design by Page Design Group in Sacramento. I did all the WordPress programming and front-end work (HTML/CSS)

Marty Thornley

Marty is actually a film maker who got into web development by mistake. So many of us find web design (or WordPress work) because we fell into it a passion we found we had. Marty’s done a lot of custom website for for artists and photographers.

Here’s what he had to say about his work:

My company is PhotographyBlogSites.com. We provide hosted WordPress sites for photographers, using a WordPress multisite setup including premium themes and plugins. It is a subscription based service that includes hosting, maintenance, upgrades and daily backups for $29/month or $299/year.

Here’s what Marty had to say when we asked a few more in depth questions about WordPress website:

How long have you been using WordPress? Going on 5 years
How long have you been doing client work with WordPress? Same. I was doing static HTML sites, then customizing Blogger blogs, then I started learning WordPress as another way to provide websites to clients.
Do you do design / coding – or both? Coding. I started doing both, just building site myself but quickly found I like the programming more than design.
For either, do you work alone or with others (inside your company or out)? I will customize themes or build plugins on my own. I have worked alongside design departments at companies. I started working with my PhotographyBlogSites partner, Ellen Petty and her company Identity Kitchen 3+ years ago programming custom websites for photographers. Then we founded Photography BlogSites together.
What are your favorite free WordPress plugins? WooCommerce! – Best e-commerce plugin ever! All in one SEO Pack, WP-DB Manager, Google XML Sitemaps
Do you have favorite premium plugins? Honestly don’t use too many typical ones but in starting to use MultiSite, I found WPMUDev, which has the BEST MultiSite plugins around.
Do you use premium themes with clients, or custom create your own (or both)? Create my own. I tried every theme framework under the sun and found them all to be whole new learning curves.
Have you ever contributed to the official WordPress.org support forums? Yes. I answer questions whenever I can.
Do you sell your own themes / plugins – have you ever put anything in the WP.org free repositories? I don’t have any premium themes or plugins just this second but soon. I have several free ones in the repository. I have a new plugin framework that just went live last night called “PluginStarter” which will be the basis of several new plugins.
If you could specifically request something be included in the next release of WordPress – what would it be? Don’t really have a great answer for this one. Lots of BIG things – Better over all admin area ( better organized, better design, more responsive and usable on tablet and ipad, etc… )
If you could magically have a plugin developed to do anything you want for free – what features would you ask for? Backup single blogs within a MultiSite install and provide export of database and a .zip download of a single blog’s files.
What is the “typical” WordPress client for you – describe the average project or website? 1) A photographer looking for an easy to use, managed site. 2) Someone needing custom theme or plugin tweaks.
What’s your rate $100
Do you attend or speak at any WordPress meetups or WordCamps (and if so which ones?) I was part of a panel of speakers at WordCamp LA 2010 and presented a talk about premium MultiSite networks at WordCamp LA 2011. I’ll be attending WordCamp OC in a few weeks.
Where can people find you online (other than your website), social media, etc.? Twitter: @martythornley, @photoblogsites
Facebook: facebook.com/photoblogsites
Any closing remarks about WordPress or yourself we didn’t cover you might want to get out there? WordPress has provided an amazing tool for free using the GPL license. All they ask is that developers respect that license. PLEASE… Do not support themes and plugins that try to use any license other than that. Any theme or plugin that has an “End User License Agreement” or tries to say you can only use it one site, two sites, etc. is not respecting that license. If you are a fellow creative person like a photographer, support the licenses and copyright of others and support only GPL WordPress projects.

Here’s some examples of Marty Thornley’s WordPress website work:

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5 Los Angeles WordPress Developers You Should Be Following