Thesis chapter headings, any suggestions?

Question

I've found a thesis with really beautiful chapter headings that I would like to use. What package am I going to need and how would I go about creating a heading that looks like the one below. Also, if you have or know of any nice headings do please share!

Answer 1

Here's an option using the titlesec package:

I've used the general format of the titleformat command:

% from the titlesec package
%\titleformat{ command }
%             [ shape ]
%             { format }{ label }{ sep }{ before-code }[ after-code ]

You can find more information by studying the documentation, and by viewing other similar questions on this site.

Here's a complete MWE to play with:

% arara: pdflatex
\documentclass{report}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage[explicit]{titlesec}

% title format for the chapter
\titleformat{\chapter}
    {\bfseries\large}
    {}
    {0pt}
    {\titlerule[3pt]~\raisebox{-1.5pt}{\sc{\chaptername}~\thechapter}~\titlerule[3pt]%
            \\\vspace{.05cm}\titlerule\\\filcenter #1 \\\vspace{.25cm}\titlerule}
\begin{document}
\chapter{First chapter}
\lipsum[1]
\chapter{Second chapter}
\lipsum[2]

\end{document}

---

You mention that you might like to see other ideas; here's another one, again using the titlesec package but without the explicit option - I have used the tcolorbox package to put a box around the chapter number. I don't know if I'd recommend it for a thesis, but it might give you some further ideas:

Here's the code:

% arara: pdflatex
% !arara: indent: {overwrite: yes}
\documentclass{report}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage{titlesec}
\usepackage{tcolorbox}
\tcbuselibrary{skins}

% title format for the chapter
% custom chapter
\titleformat{\chapter}
{\normalfont\Large\filleft\bfseries}                    % format applied to label+text
{}                                                      % label
{1pc}                                                   % horizontal separation between label and title body
{%
    % draw a box around the chapter number
    \begin{tcolorbox}[
            enhanced,flushright upper,
            boxrule=1.4pt,
            colback=white,colframe=black!50!yellow,
            drop fuzzy midday shadow=black!50!yellow,
        width=2.8cm]
        \resizebox{2cm}{!}{\color{gray!80}\thechapter}%
    \end{tcolorbox}\Huge} % before the title body
[]                        % after the title body
\begin{document}
\chapter{First chapter}
\lipsum[1]
\chapter{Second chapter}
\lipsum[2]

\end{document}