diff --git a/docs/settings.rst b/docs/settings.rst
index 0b70e461..853b5745 100644
--- a/docs/settings.rst
+++ b/docs/settings.rst
@@ -34,6 +34,8 @@ Setting name              what it does ?
 `DEFAULT_LANG`            The default language to use. Default is 'en'.
 `DISPLAY_PAGES_ON_MENU`   Display or not the pages on the menu of the template.
                           Templates can follow or not this settings.
+`DIRECT_TEMPLATES`        Tuple, containing templates to render. There should be
+                          a html file for each of these templates in the theme.
 `FALLBACK_ON_FS_DATE`     If True, pelican will use the file system dates infos
                           (mtime) if it can't get informations from the
                           metadata?
diff --git a/pelican/generators.py b/pelican/generators.py
index 1f72b87e..6c67f07f 100755
--- a/pelican/generators.py
+++ b/pelican/generators.py
@@ -16,7 +16,6 @@ from pelican.readers import read_file
 
 _TEMPLATES = ('index', 'tag', 'tags', 'article', 'category', 'categories',
               'archives', 'page')
-_DIRECT_TEMPLATES = ('index', 'tags', 'categories', 'archives')
 
 
 class Generator(object):
@@ -30,21 +29,23 @@ class Generator(object):
         for arg, value in kwargs.items():
             setattr(self, arg, value)
 
-    def get_templates(self):
-        """Return the templates to use.
+        # templates cache
+        self._templates = {}
+        self._templates_path = os.path.expanduser(os.path.join(self.theme, 'templates'))
+        self._env = Environment(loader = FileSystemLoader(self._templates_path))
+
+    def get_template(self, name):
+        """Return the template by name.
         Use self.theme to get the templates to use, and return a list of
         templates ready to use with Jinja2.
         """
-        path = os.path.expanduser(os.path.join(self.theme, 'templates'))
-        env = Environment(loader=FileSystemLoader(path))
-        templates = {}
-        for template in _TEMPLATES:
+        if name not in self._templates:
             try:
-                templates[template] = env.get_template('%s.html' % template)
+                self._templates[name] = self._env.get_template(name + '.html')
             except TemplateNotFound:
                 raise Exception('[templates] unable to load %s.html from %s' % (
-                    template, path))
-        return templates
+                    name, self._templates_path))
+        return self._templates[name]
 
     def get_files(self, path, exclude=[], extensions=None):
         """Return a list of files to use, based on rules
@@ -130,23 +131,28 @@ class ArticlesGenerator(Generator):
         """Generate the pages on the disk
         TODO: change the name"""
 
-        templates = self.get_templates()
         write = partial(
             writer.write_file,
             relative_urls = self.settings.get('RELATIVE_URLS')
         )
-        for template in _DIRECT_TEMPLATES:
-            write('%s.html' % template, templates[template], self.context,
+        for template in self.settings.get('DIRECT_TEMPLATES'):
+            write('%s.html' % template, self.get_template(template), self.context,
                     blog=True)
+
+        tag_template = self.get_template('tag')
         for tag, articles in self.tags.items():
-            write('tag/%s.html' % tag, templates['tag'], self.context, tag=tag,
+            write('tag/%s.html' % tag, tag_template, self.context, tag=tag,
                     articles=articles)
+
+        category_template = self.get_template('category')
         for cat in self.categories:
-            write('category/%s.html' % cat, templates['category'], self.context,
+            write('category/%s.html' % cat, category_template, self.context,
                           category=cat, articles=self.categories[cat])
+
+        article_template = self.get_template('article')
         for article in chain(self.translations, self.articles):
             write(article.save_as,
-                          templates['article'], self.context, article=article,
+                          article_template, self.context, article=article,
                           category=article.category)
 
     def generate_context(self):
@@ -252,9 +258,8 @@ class PagesGenerator(Generator):
         self.context['PAGES'] = self.pages
 
     def generate_output(self, writer):
-        templates = self.get_templates()
         for page in chain(self.translations, self.pages):
-            writer.write_file('pages/%s' % page.save_as, templates['page'],
+            writer.write_file('pages/%s' % page.save_as, self.get_template('page'),
                     self.context, page=page,
                     relative_urls = self.settings.get('RELATIVE_URLS'))
 
diff --git a/pelican/settings.py b/pelican/settings.py
index d931cf02..85f7a6a5 100644
--- a/pelican/settings.py
+++ b/pelican/settings.py
@@ -24,6 +24,7 @@ _DEFAULT_CONFIG = {'PATH': None,
                    'DEFAULT_LANG': 'en',
                    'TAG_CLOUD_STEPS': 4,
                    'TAG_CLOUD_MAX_ITEMS': 100,
+                   'DIRECT_TEMPLATES': ('index', 'tags', 'categories', 'archives'),
                   }
 
 def read_settings(filename):