How to change the theme of Office 2013

I've been following with great interest the media's reporting of the upcoming release of Windows 8.1, which is designed to fix many consumer complaints about the operating system.  The first report I saw a few weeks ago included a link to a website that listed the fixes expected to be a part of 8.1. In today's paper there was an Associated Press article by Ryan Nakashima that stated a preview of 8.1 is now available for download, mostly intended for Microsoft partners and technology developers but downloadable by anyone. Neither of these reports indicate that fixing the color scheme is part of 8.1.

This, however, is the statement that brought me back to this forum to post:  "Julie Larson-Green, the head of Microsoft's Windows division, said the update, rapid by Microsoft standards, 'shows how much more responsive our engineering has become.' " OMG, could this woman be more out of touch? This forum and others across the internet are loaded with comments by stressed users about how much we hate the inability to customize the color scheme, yet it does not appear this is an issue addressed by the responsive engineering team at Microsoft.

Like many Windows 8 users, I've adjusted to the whole tile concept. I rarely use anything on the tile screen. I just click on the Desktop tile and go about my business. But these developers of 8.1 are working on making the tile experience better and getting more apps available. These folks seem really disconnected from the consumers' needs.

Or maybe I'm just confused that the problems of Office 2013 could be addressed by an upgraded Windows release.

Oi..... Microsoft's - do you ever listen to your customers???

This has been going on for month & months, look at the previous posts, as well as the other 3 threads all saying the same thing... ITS TOO BRIGHT!

No one is the same and we like a bit of choice, so to try and fit us into the "You only get White, Grey, Dark Grey (which isn't really dark)" is preposterous. Please, please give us the ability to make changes to all aspects of the background, i.e. darker and less offensive - your turning people away from what generally could be a good product.

P.S. Its not just the banner background in Outlook were moaning about and want to change (what you call Office Background and Office Theme ) its the main body reading panes as well - come on, pull you finger out and action these simple requests from your customers.

Shacks, there's no room up there for their fingers because theirs heads are up there. The real solution here is never going to happen - get Bill Gates back in charge of software. He would never have released this pile of **** on an unsuspecting and loyal public. He's a multi-billionaire because he LISTENED to what people wanted and gave it to them. That is obviously gone at Microsoft without him. They think they know better and force-feed us what they want, not what we want. Reading the thousands and thousands of posts about how unhappy people are, it's hard to swallow Microsoft's statement that they aren't entertaining any more themes.

I spoke with their Answer Team and was assured this is "top of mind" at Microsoft and that ARE working on it. Does anyone believe that? I then asked why someone couldn't take the two minutes to post an apology, tell us they are working on it feverishly and when we can expect an update. Too much to ask? I don't think so.

Thank you for the feedback on Office’s new look. We are actively collecting, sorting and reading through feedback on Office 2013’s design and User Experience. As the audience for Office 2013 grows, we are being mindful of patterns and pain points that emerge from user feedback. While we do not have any additional Themes planned at this time, it is an issue we are watching very closely.

Great!  When you stop watching and start doing let me know; until then 2013 goes in the same pile as ME, ME2 (Vista), and ME3 (8).  Lots of potential obliterated by some mind-numbingly silly design decisions.