customizing templates- caw customizable are they really? help!

i am new to all this... but am looking into using zen for a new homewares store. I have a developer mate who reckons he can do all the prog necesssary... my concern is that i am very fussy about the look of the site.. i want to adjust colours, fonts, the location of buttons, size of images etc. Can this be done with a bought template? or do i have to use it how it comes? eg. i've found a template i like the layout of generally, but would like to change the font throughout, change the colours, and obviously the header etc. is this possible? i have a graphic background so know my way around photoshop etc.
How do i muck around with the look of the site? do i use illustrator? photoshop?dreamweaver? help!!

Build you own template and you can do pretty much anything you want. You can a wide variety of examples from different designers at (sorry, site offline)/hoff.php and I have as many again (and all different) waiting to be added.

I achieve my designs using Dreamweaver and until recently Photoshop. With the arrival of CS3 I have switched to Fireworks whose focus on web design means that it now exceeds Photoshop in nifty tools for us designer types working in the web world.

Most of the work though goes into tweaking Zen Cart's PHP templates to produce the HTML that I want, and the stylesheet to give it the look I desire.

First, before you buy a template, do a search on the forum for the designer.

Second, most of your changes will be in the stylesheet. It controls all of the fonts, colors, background images, spacing and some of the positioning.

Third, the most wisely used tool is a simple text editor if you do have to edit one of the php files.

Also, the tutorials and this very forum are great places to get information :)

Shirley