As the premium WordPress themes market continues to grow and competition becomes more intense, it is only natural to begin looking towards the future of premium WordPress themes. We all have different opinions of what that future holds, but one thing that is for sure. Widgets are going to play a huge role in the future of these themes.

The first theme that appears to be focused completely around widgets is the Shifter WordPress theme, which features a fully customizable dashboard with widgets for pretty much everything.

Here are two screen shots:

My buddy Jeffro of Jeffro2pt0 is one of those guys that is always ahead of the times. If you’d like to see an example of what Shifter can do, I recommend you check out his website. He switched to Shifter awhile ago and hasn’t looked back. You can also read his explanation for “shifting” to Shifter.

Sound interesting? You can purchase Shifter for $79.95 for a single-use copy, $99.95 for a single-use copy with support from the author, advanced copy is $199.95, and the developer’s package is $999.95.

If you’d like to learn more, I recommend you check out Shifter’s website.

Today Adii of Premium News announced that he is giving away an all-inclusive Premium News theme package (valued at $499.95) for free to one random person that writes a post talking about it.   The lucky winner gets all 7 themes for free, as well as a copy of any future themes that are released.

Also in his post, Adii announced that he has completed updates to his original four themes and those that have purchased the theme are entitled to a free update.  If you didn’t get an e-mail from him, you’ll want to contact him.

Today I noticed that there is more good work coming from the premium WordPress team over at iThemes.   They have continued the trend of carving out their own niche, this time with a Corporate theme, designed specifically for small corporations.

I think it is great that they’ve recognized many small businesses and corporations are switching to WordPress for creating their websites/blogs and they are doing a great job of filling the need.   This theme comes with the following features:

• Web 2.0 glossy look
• 6 pre-built color styles
• Integrated blog component
• Static home page which can be edited through Dashboard and Widgets
• Widgets for easy text editing of sidebars
• Upload a new header image through Theme Options tab (PSD included)

So, how does it look?   Here is a screen shot of the front page:

And here is the post page:

As mentioned above, there are 6 different colors to choose from (Blue, Green, Orange, Red, Teal, White), and it is available at the really low price of $29.95 for a single-use license, or $39.95 for a multiple-use license.   Check out the Corporate theme.

When I started this WordPress blog, one of my goals was to feature my favorite WordPress themes.   At the time premium WordPress themes did not exist, so I spent a lot of time featuring my favorite free WordPress themes.   Going forward, as free themes catch my eye, I’m hoping to spend more time featuring them on this blog.

I generally prefer 2-column themes, but there are situations where a 3-column WordPress theme can be a better fit for a blog.  If you’re looking for a free 3-column theme, look no further than the Silveray Theme by Blog Perfume.  This is not a term I use loosely, but I have to say that this theme is premium quality.   Here are some screenshots:

Silveray Top 

Silveray Footer

If you’d like to use this theme for a WordPress blog, you can download it here.

I have added this theme to the appropriate WordPress theme galleries.