My readomatic directed me to a post by Anurag Arora, in which he gives detailed instructions on how to install several Ubuntu themes by Francois Vogelweith. Since Mr. Vogelweith himself writes in French, these English-language instructions are invaluable.
There is one spot in the instructions which might confuse the unwary, though. In the line
sudo apt-key adv –recv-keys –keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com 0×1781bd45c4c3275a34bb6aec6e871c4a881574de
you need two hyphens before the words “recv” and “keyserver” (first occurrence). This isn’t necessarily obvious when reading the small font the line is written in.
These themes are well worth the effort of adding the extra repository. The files are large, but that’s because they contain a lot of extras you often don’t get in a theme download. For example, each theme comes with its own set of icons (though they’re mostly similar except for the colors). They also come with matching desktop backgrounds and GDM (login screen) themes.
I tried a few of these themes before settling on Balanzan (screenshot below):
Balanzan fits in well with the standard Ubuntu color scheme. That means if you don’t like the icons that come with the theme, it will work well with the default Human icons as well. I haven’t had that problem, but I can tell that the alternate icons may not fit everyone’s taste.
Two of the other themes, Bamboo Zen and Aquadreams, look like they would make good themes for Linux Mint if I ever get around to messing around with the new version (Linux Mint 7 Gloria).
Dances With Ubuntu 
awesome………….balanzan jai ho……..
I like the Balanzan them too, nice shade of brown.
However, I would like to change the top menu bar to be a lighter brown. How would I change that? I have tried right clicking on the menu bar but it doesn’t seem to change the colour across the whole length.
And, how would I change it to make use of some of the original icons if that is possible? eg the network connection icon.
Thanks.
Zac,
I don’t know what to tell you about the top panel. I’ve messed around with the Panel Properties menu, and I can’t get the Window buttons or the system tray to change color.
As for the icons, there is a way to use a whole different set of icons with the theme. Here are the steps:
1. Go to System –> Preferences –> Appearance.
2. In the Appearance box, click Customize (while Balanzan is the current theme).
3. Under the Icons tab, click whichever other icon set you want to use. Since you’re talking about “original icons,” you’d probably want to click Human.
Unfortunately, I don’t know how to change one icon while leaving the rest of the set alone.
You might want to check out the Ubuntu forums for more help.