Header, menus and footer
Chapter 3 of the Inkwell user guide.
The announcement bar and header sit in the Header group at the top of the editor's section list; the footer is in the Footer group at the bottom. They show on every page.
Announcement bar
The thin cover-colored bar across the top of every page. Background: Cover (default), Page or Blotter. It holds up to four blocks:
- Announcement: Icon (None, Download, Envelope, Star or Tag), Lead ("Instant download", printed in bold before the text), Text ("Print at home or use in your note-taking app") and Link. With two or more announcements, they take turns every 6 seconds, with previous, pause and next buttons; they pause while a shopper hovers or focuses them, and never rotate for visitors who prefer reduced motion. Put your most important message first.
- Countdown (one per bar): a live countdown ("2 d 14 h 22 m", in whole minutes). Label ("Sale ends in"), End date (format 2026-11-27), End time (24-hour, default 23:59), Time zone (Store time zone, or a UTC offset), Link, and After the deadline: Hide the countdown (default) or Show a message (Message after the deadline, "This sale has ended"). Screen readers hear the deadline written out, not the ticking numbers.
Use a real deadline that is the same for every shopper, such as the last day of a launch price. Shopify doesn't allow fake countdowns, so don't extend or restart a deadline to create urgency.
Header
| Setting | Default | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Menu | Main menu | The header's menu |
| Menu style | Mega menu | Mega menu shows a top-level link's child links as columns when they have links of their own (below). Other top-level links keep a Dropdown, a short list under the link. |
| Open menus on hover | On | For shoppers using a mouse. Menus always open on click, tap and keyboard. |
| Highlighted menu link | Freebies | A top-level link with this title gets a small sticky-note mark, such as Freebies. Capitals don't matter. Leave it blank for none. |
| Show search | On | A search field in the header on desktops (an icon that opens a search panel on tablets and phones), with suggestions and matching products as shoppers type. Search placeholder: "Search planners and printables". |
| Sticky header | On scroll up | None, Always (stays at the top of the screen) or On scroll up (hides while shoppers scroll down and comes back when they scroll up) |
On desktops (990px and wider) the header is one row: the wordmark (or logo), your menu, then the search field and the account and cart icons. When the menu can't fit on that row, it moves into the menu drawer, as on tablets. On tablets the row is the menu button, the wordmark, then search, account and cart; on phones it is a slimmer row with the same buttons. The cart icon carries a small count bubble once something is in it. The account panel's menu is set in Theme settings › Customer accounts.
Menu promo blocks (up to six) add a small sheet to the end of a mega menu panel: an Image, a Heading ("Get a free weekly planner"), a Link and its Link label ("Take a look"). Set Menu item to the title of the top-level link it belongs to, such as Planners. Each link shows up to two promos, in block order, and a promo without a heading isn't shown. Promos only appear on links that open a mega panel; in the theme editor, a promo that no panel shows says so.
Menus
Build menus in admin under Content › Menus. In the main menu, with Menu style set to Mega menu:
- A top-level link with two levels of children (Planners › Weekly, Daily, Undated, each with links of its own) opens a mega panel: one column per child, each headed by the child's title with its own links under it, then that link's menu promos.
- A top-level link with one level of children (Printables › Trackers, Budget, Meal planning, Wall planners) opens a dropdown.
- A top-level link without children is a plain link.
A good main menu for a planner shop: Planners ▸, Printables ▸, Templates, Notion, Freebies, Journal. Keep it short enough to sit on one row beside the search field; anything longer moves into the menu drawer.
The phone menu (the menu drawer) shows your main menu as rows (a row with children slides in a panel of its own, with a back row), then Log in or Account, and the country and language selectors.
Footer
The footer is a cover band. Its settings:
| Setting | Default | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Background | Cover | Cover, Page or Blotter |
| Show the shop name and blurb | On | Your shop name in the heading font with the Blurb under it ("Planners and printables designed in a small studio. Printed by you, at home, the same day.") |
| Text after the copyright | Empty | A short line in the base row, such as where you're based. The presets name their fonts here ("Set in Libre Baskerville and Proza Libre"); change it. |
| Show country and language selectors | On | Set up markets and languages in Shopify admin (chapter 15) |
| Show policy links | On | Links to the policies you've written in Settings › Policies |
| Show payment icons | On | The payment methods your store accepts |
| Show Powered by Shopify | Off |
It holds these blocks, in any order:
- Menu column: Heading ("Shop") and Menu (the footer menu by default). The presets have Shop and Help columns.
- Text column: Heading ("About the studio") and Text, for a short story, opening hours or how to reach you.
- Newsletter: Heading ("Notes from the studio"), Text ("New printables, freebies and the odd planning tip, once a month.") and Show Follow on Shop (on: lets customers follow your store in the Shop app). Sign-ups are tagged
newsletter. - Social media: Heading ("Follow the studio") and the icons from Theme settings › Social media.
- The theme blocks of chapter 5 (Heading, Text, Button and the rest).
The Section, Rich text, Newsletter, How it works, As featured in and Custom Liquid sections can also go in the footer group.