diff --git CHANGELOG.txt CHANGELOG.txt
index 1b8b4a2..002b9ed 100644
--- CHANGELOG.txt
+++ CHANGELOG.txt
@@ -1,5 +1,6 @@
 Zen 6.x-2.x-dev, xxxx-xx-xx (development release)
 ---------------------------
+- #705264 by JohnAlbin, Jehu, mlncn and zenic: Allow Zen (and subthemes) to be used without a database
 - #1046090 by daniels and JohnAlbin: $styles is destroyed by rare bug with APC
 - #1083700: Add $submitted variable back into node.tpl
 - #1086820 by tacituseu: Views classes redundant since Views 6.x-2.9
diff --git zen-internals/template.conditional-styles.inc zen-internals/template.conditional-styles.inc
index 8211d1a..eb23dbc 100644
--- zen-internals/template.conditional-styles.inc
+++ zen-internals/template.conditional-styles.inc
@@ -2,8 +2,8 @@
 // The code for conditional stylesheets started out as a patch for Zen. Now that
 // it has been spun out to its own separate module, It would be nice to prevent
 // code drift between the Zen implementation and the conditional_styles.module,
-// so Zen now includes an exact copy of conditonal_style module's:
-// conditional_styles.theme.inc,v 1.6 2009/08/24 08:57:32 johnalbin Exp
+// so Zen now includes an exact copy of conditonal_style module's
+// conditional_styles.theme.inc file.
 
 /**
  * @file
@@ -95,9 +95,14 @@ function _conditional_styles_theme($existing, $type, $theme, $path) {
       }
       // Save the stylesheets for later retrieval.
       if ($conditional_styles) {
-        variable_set('conditional_styles_' . $theme, $conditional_styles);
+        if (db_is_active()) {
+          variable_set('conditional_styles_' . $theme, $conditional_styles);
+        }
+        else {
+          $GLOBALS['conf']['conditional_styles_' . $theme] = $conditional_styles;
+        }
       }
-      else {
+      elseif (db_is_active()) {
         variable_del('conditional_styles_' . $theme);
       }
     }
diff --git zen-internals/template.theme-registry.inc zen-internals/template.theme-registry.inc
index 9127125..b6fdf4c 100644
--- zen-internals/template.theme-registry.inc
+++ zen-internals/template.theme-registry.inc
@@ -120,7 +120,12 @@ function zen_theme_get_default_settings($theme) {
     // Merge the defaults with the theme settings saved in the database.
     $settings = array_merge($defaults, variable_get('theme_'. $theme .'_settings', array()));
     // Save the settings back to the database.
-    variable_set('theme_'. $theme .'_settings', $settings);
+    if (db_is_active()) {
+      variable_set('theme_'. $theme .'_settings', $settings);
+    }
+    else {
+      $GLOBALS['conf']['theme_'. $theme .'_settings'] = $settings;
+    }
     // If the active theme has been loaded, force refresh of Drupal internals.
     if (!empty($GLOBALS['theme_key'])) {
       theme_get_setting('', TRUE);