Gmail recently introduced themes which seem to be an off-shoot from iGoogle to all its users. Here's how you can change the default theme to one of the newer options provided by Gmail.
Sign in to your Gmail account.
Click on the Settings link in the upper right corner of your Gmail window.
Click on the new 'Themes' tab in your Settings window.
Select a Gmail theme of your choice. My choices are Shiny and Ninja. Just clicking on the Gmail theme of your choice will be applied to...