Rubik Variant Images on Apparent Collective Themes: Madrid, Sydney, Berlin & More (2026)
Apparent Collective is a Shopify theme studio based in Valletta, Malta. They have a distinctive approach: every theme is named after a city, every theme costs $380, and every theme targets a slightly different vertical while sharing some core design DNA. Madrid, Sydney, Berlin, Zurich, Milan, Oslo, and Copenhagen are all supported by Rubik Variant Images.
What makes Apparent Collective interesting (and occasionally tricky) is that their themes look different on the surface but share significant code underneath. That is a good thing for us. It means a fix or improvement to one Apparent Collective theme often applies to the rest with minor adjustments. We still test each theme individually, though, because visual differences in gallery layout do create real differences in how image filtering needs to behave.
This post covers all 7 Apparent Collective themes. If you are running any of them and want to filter product images by variant, add custom swatches, or use AI to auto-assign images, everything here applies to your theme.
In this post
- Apparent Collective overview
- Madrid
- Sydney
- Berlin
- Zurich
- Milan
- Oslo
- Copenhagen
- Comparison table
- Setup
- Pairing with Rubik Combined Listings
- FAQ
- Related reading
Apparent Collective: city-named, $380 each, built in Malta
The city naming convention is not just branding. Each theme draws design inspiration from the city it is named after. Madrid has warm tones and a fashion-forward layout. Berlin is more industrial and minimal. Copenhagen has that Scandinavian clean-line aesthetic. Whether these associations actually influence buyer decisions is debatable, but the themes themselves are well-built and well-maintained.
At $380 per theme, they sit in the premium tier of the Shopify Theme Store. That price point means merchants expect everything to work perfectly with third-party apps. And honestly? It should. Premium themes that break when you install a swatch app are not premium, they are just expensive.
All 7 Apparent Collective themes pass our compatibility tests. Rubik detects each theme automatically and applies the correct gallery selectors, transition handling, and swatch injection points. No manual configuration needed from the merchant side.
Madrid
Madrid is the fashion-focused option in the Apparent Collective lineup. It uses a full-width product gallery with a horizontal slider and thumbnail strip. The design is bold: large images, generous spacing, strong typography.
Rubik filters the horizontal slider and syncs the thumbnail strip when a customer selects a variant. Madrid’s transitions between images use a slide animation, and Rubik preserves this animation during filtering. The experience is that the gallery smoothly shifts to show only the selected variant’s images, rather than abruptly replacing everything.
Madrid also supports a “featured variant” display where the first variant’s images are prominently shown on page load. Rubik respects this. The initial page load shows the featured variant’s images, and subsequent selections filter correctly from there.
Sydney
Sydney targets outdoor, sports, and active lifestyle brands. The product page has an image-heavy layout with a hero image that can be pinned while the user scrolls through product details. Think of it as a parallax-style product experience.
Rubik works with Sydney’s pinned gallery behavior. When a variant is selected, the pinned gallery updates with the filtered images. The pin position does not reset (which would be jarring), it simply swaps the available images within the current view state. We had to handle this specifically because most themes do not use pinned gallery elements.
Sydney’s mobile layout drops the pinned behavior and uses a standard swipeable carousel. Rubik adapts to both layouts automatically, filtering the carousel on mobile and the pinned gallery on desktop.
Berlin
Berlin is the minimalist in the lineup. Clean lines, lots of white space, a product gallery that uses a simple stacked layout. No carousel, no masonry, just images listed vertically with the variant selector alongside.
This simplicity makes Rubik’s job straightforward on Berlin. Filtering removes non-matching images from the stack, and the page reflows. It is one of the easiest Apparent Collective themes to work with from a technical perspective.
Berlin’s minimalist approach means that unfiltered galleries look particularly messy. A product with 6 colors and 3 images each creates a wall of 18 images scrolling down the page. Filtering them to the relevant 3 transforms the page from cluttered to focused. The visual payoff is bigger on minimalist themes because there is nothing else on the page to distract from the image overload.
Zurich
Zurich targets luxury and high-end retail. The product page uses a large single-image viewer with a subtle thumbnail row. The overall feel is similar to a gallery exhibition, with each image given space to breathe.
Rubik works with Zurich’s single-image viewer. When filtering by variant, the thumbnail row updates to show only relevant images, and the main viewer navigates within the filtered set. The zoom functionality (which Zurich includes by default) works correctly on filtered images.
If you sell watches, jewelry, or designer goods on Zurich theme, the combination of high-quality product photography and variant-specific image filtering makes a real difference to how customers evaluate your products.
Milan
Milan is designed for fashion and beauty brands. It has a side-by-side product page layout (gallery left, details right) with a vertical thumbnail strip and a large main image area. The design leans heavily into visual impact.
Rubik filters the vertical thumbnail strip and main image on Milan. The vertical strip is interesting because it scrolls independently of the page on desktop (it has its own scroll container). Rubik’s filtering adjusts the scrollable area height to match the number of filtered images. If your “Black” variant has 5 images and your “White” variant has 3, the scroll container shrinks accordingly. No empty scroll space.
Oslo
Oslo targets home and furniture stores. The product page gallery supports a mix of standard photos and room scene images. The layout uses a grid of product images with a larger featured image at the top.
Rubik works with Oslo’s image grid. For furniture stores, variant image filtering is especially valuable because customers want to see the exact fabric or finish they are considering, not a gallery of 30 images across every option. A sofa available in 10 fabrics with 3 images each creates 30 gallery images. Filtering down to the 3 images matching “Navy Linen” makes the decision easier.
One useful Rubik feature on Oslo: you can mark certain images as “common” (always visible regardless of variant selection). That is perfect for room scene shots that show the product in context but are not color-specific.
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the Scandinavian-inspired option. Clean, bright, airy. The product page uses a horizontal carousel with smooth scroll-snap behavior. The overall design feels like a curated online showroom.
Rubik filters the carousel and updates the scroll-snap points after filtering. Copenhagen uses CSS scroll-snap for its gallery, which means the browser handles the snapping behavior. Rubik recalculates the snap positions when images are removed or added during filtering. Without this recalculation, the carousel would snap to weird positions or show half-images. We caught this early in testing.
Copenhagen’s bright aesthetic pairs well with color-variant-heavy stores (candles, ceramics, textiles) where the product color is a primary buying factor.
Apparent Collective themes comparison
| Theme | Price | Gallery style | Best for | Rubik status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Madrid | $380 | Horizontal slider + thumbnails | Fashion | Fully supported |
| Sydney | $380 | Pinned hero + carousel (mobile) | Outdoor, sports | Fully supported |
| Berlin | $380 | Stacked vertical | Minimalist stores | Fully supported |
| Zurich | $380 | Single viewer + thumbnails | Luxury, high-end | Fully supported |
| Milan | $380 | Side-by-side, vertical strip | Fashion, beauty | Fully supported |
| Oslo | $380 | Grid with featured image | Home, furniture | Fully supported |
| Copenhagen | $380 | Horizontal scroll-snap | Curated stores | Fully supported |
All 7 themes are priced identically at $380, which is unusual. Most studios price themes differently based on feature sets. Apparent Collective treats them as equals, just optimized for different aesthetics and verticals.
Setup steps
- Install Rubik Variant Images from the Shopify App Store. The free plan covers 1 product for testing.
- Enable the app embed: Theme editor > App embeds > Toggle on Rubik Variant Images.
- Pick a product in the Rubik dashboard. Click on a variant and drag the images you want assigned to it.
- Try AI auto-assign for faster setup. The app analyzes product titles, variant names, filenames, and image alt text to match images automatically.
- Save and preview. Open the product page, click through variants, and confirm the gallery filters correctly.
For stores with large catalogs, bulk assign processes hundreds of products in the background using image-order patterns. Full setup guide: show only selected variant images.
See the live demo store, watch the demo video, or read the getting started guide.
Pairing with Rubik Combined Listings
Rubik Variant Images handles product page gallery filtering. It does not show swatches on collection pages and it does not link separate products together. For that, you need Rubik Combined Listings.
The two apps are designed to work together. RVI filters the product page gallery. RCL adds swatches to collection page product cards and groups separate products into virtual combined listings. If you are running an Apparent Collective theme and want the full experience (filtered product images AND collection page color swatches), install both.
Both apps run on all 7 Apparent Collective themes without conflicts. Image assignments stay in Shopify metafields, so there is no data overlap between the two apps. For the full story on combined listings and how they work, the combined listings guide on Rubikify covers everything. For general Shopify SEO strategy and how variant images affect your search rankings, the 2026 SEO checklist on Craftshift is worth a read.
“Excellent support! I was struggling with the variant image filtering on my theme, but the support team (Umid) fixed the selectors manually within minutes. The app now works perfectly. Highly recommended!”
Anonymous merchant, 5-star review, February 2026 – Rubik Variant Images on the Shopify App Store
Frequently asked questions
Does Rubik work with all Apparent Collective themes?
Yes. All 7 city-named themes (Madrid, Sydney, Berlin, Zurich, Milan, Oslo, Copenhagen) are fully supported with dedicated detection code.
Are all Apparent Collective themes really $380?
Yes. Apparent Collective uses uniform pricing across their entire lineup. Every theme costs $380 as a one-time purchase on the Shopify Theme Store.
Does Rubik work with Sydney’s pinned gallery?
Yes. Rubik updates the pinned gallery content when a variant is selected, swapping images within the current view state without resetting the scroll position. On mobile, where Sydney drops to a standard carousel, Rubik adapts automatically.
Can I keep certain images visible for all variants?
Yes. Rubik lets you mark images as “common” so they always appear regardless of which variant is selected. This is perfect for size charts, lifestyle shots, or room scene images on Oslo theme.
What does Rubik Variant Images cost?
Free: $0/month for 1 product. Starter: $25/month for 100. Advanced: $50/month for 1,000. Premium: $75/month for unlimited. Flat pricing, not based on your Shopify plan tier.
If I switch from one Apparent Collective theme to another, do I lose my image assignments?
No. All assignments are stored in Shopify product metafields. Switching from Madrid to Copenhagen (or any other theme, even outside Apparent Collective) keeps your Rubik data intact.
Does Copenhagen’s scroll-snap gallery work correctly with Rubik?
Yes. Rubik recalculates CSS scroll-snap positions after filtering so the carousel snaps correctly to the remaining images. No half-image displays or broken snap points.
Related reading
