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Shopify Theme Development Basics

Introduction to Liquid, theme structure, and customizing storefronts for African merchants.

1 min readMay 5, 2025by Amina Hassan

The Shopify theme stack

Shopify themes use Liquid for templating, plus HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. No React required for classic themes.

Theme folder structure

theme/
├── layout/
│   └── theme.liquid
├── templates/
│   ├── index.json
│   └── product.json
├── sections/
│   └── hero.liquid
└── assets/
    └── theme.css

Liquid basics

{% for product in collections.featured.products limit: 4 %}
  <article class="product-card">
    <h3>{{ product.title }}</h3>
    <p>{{ product.price | money }}</p>
  </article>
{% endfor %}

Section schema

{% schema %}
{
  "name": "Hero banner",
  "settings": [
    {
      "type": "text",
      "id": "heading",
      "label": "Heading",
      "default": "Welcome to our store"
    }
  ]
}
{% endschema %}

Styling for mobile-first Africa

.product-grid {
  display: grid;
  grid-template-columns: repeat(auto-fill, minmax(160px, 1fr));
  gap: 1rem;
}

Going further

Learn Shopify CLI, Online Store 2.0 sections, and the Storefront API for headless builds with Hydrogen.

Written by

AH

Amina Hassan

Shopify Partner, Cairo

Published May 5, 2025

Amina builds themes and apps for merchants selling across North and East Africa.