How to change the theme of Office 2013

I absolutely agree with everyone who chimed in on this subject. I am rolling back to 2010 ASAP. The lack of contrast is horrible! Got to hand it to Microsoft though. The outlook mail web page is just as bad. At least they are being consistent. Too bad. I was ready to plunk down my money for Office 2013.

I just read through ALL of the posts regarding the poor office themes; at least I’m not alone, but unfortunately I don’t see any resolution from Microsoft.  After shelling out over $400, I’m not going back to earlier version of Office.  One thing that I notice & have a beef with, the Dark Gray (which isn’t that great) works on ALL of my programs except with Access.  Does anybody else experience this issue?  dj

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.

You should be and need to be planning more themes at this time! Please, at least provide the themes that were available in Office 2010. The current themes are absolutely ridiculous. It reminds me of a cartoon or a 1970s web page. It makes me feel like I am using a cheap low-budget program a very young child would use. It is not at all what I would expect from Microsoft for Professionals. Please, at least tell me how I can import the themes from Office 2010. For every step forward it seems like you take 10 steps backwards. Please get it together, Microsoft! Thank You

To Microsoft:

I can understand your position of getting more data from the user community before making any "across-the-board" Theme changes.  However, as indicated by Jennie, a fallback to the themes from Office 2010 would be highly appreciated.  This bright, and bland screen really hurts my eyes after a few minutes of work.  Now, one option would be to provide "computer literate" users with a set of "Registry Keys" to change the color of backgrounds with the appropriate notifications to back up the registry before making such changes.  Then the onus would be to the user as to whether to try them or not.  Would this be an acceptable solution for the near-term?