Building a WordPress Site With Claude Code End to End

Most tutorials show one feature. Clients need a whole site. This is how I take a WordPress site from 'bare install' to 'client ready' using Claude Code as the orchestrator and my own judgment as the navigator.

The Starting Point

A fresh WordPress install. No theme, no plugins, no content. A project brief that says 'services company needs a marketing site with 5 pages, blog, and contact form.'

Four hours of work with Claude Code. Let me break it down.

Phase 1: Theme Scaffolding (45 minutes)

I describe the brand (clean, minimal, professional blue). Claude Code generates the block theme scaffolding: theme.json with the brand palette, header and footer template parts, a homepage template with hero and service sections.

Create a WordPress block theme in wp-content/themes/client-name/.
Use a professional blue palette. Include homepage, single post,
and page templates. Add reusable header and footer parts.

I activate the theme, load the homepage, tweak colors until they match the brand sample.

Phase 2: Content Structure (45 minutes)

Custom post types for services and case studies. Custom taxonomy for service categories. A plugin handles all of this:

Create a plugin at wp-content/plugins/client-name-core/ that
registers a 'service' custom post type, a 'case_study' CPT,
and a 'service_category' taxonomy. Use the standard WP APIs.

Claude Code writes the register_post_type calls with the right arguments. I activate the plugin, add three services as test content, verify the archive pages work.

Phase 3: Contact Form (30 minutes)

I could install Contact Form 7. I do not, because clients ask for custom behavior that CF7 does not support. Claude Code writes a minimal shortcode that handles form submission and emails the client.

Phase 4: Page Building (1 hour)

I build the five pages using the block editor. This is the part the client will use daily, so I spend time getting it right. Reusable patterns (saved block combos) for common sections: CTA, testimonial, service grid. The client can insert these with one click later.

Phase 5: SEO and Settings (30 minutes)

Install Yoast or RankMath for meta tags and sitemaps. Set up permalinks. Configure the WP admin to hide complexity the client does not need (disable plugin management for non-admins, disable widgets, etc).

Phase 6: Client Handoff (30 minutes)

Screen record a walkthrough: here is how to add a blog post, here is how to update the homepage hero, here is how to add a new service. Email the recording and the admin URL.

What Claude Code Did

• Theme scaffolding (JSON, HTML templates)
• Plugin PHP (post types, taxonomies, contact form)
• Custom block patterns
• Basic CSS tweaks

What I Did

• Brand judgment (colors, typography)
• Content strategy (which pages, which sections)
• Client-facing UX (what the editor sees)
• Quality assurance (everything the agent produced)

Why This Works

WordPress has strong conventions. Claude Code knows those conventions. When I ask for a CPT, it writes conventional CPT code. My judgment is applied to brand and UX, not to memorizing PHP APIs.

The site cost the client a fraction of a traditional build. I made more per hour than I would have hand-coding the same site. Both sides won.

See the WordPress Block Theme documentation for the underlying conventions and the Plugin Handbook for custom post type patterns.