Changing img directory in style XML -> no css??

[Kendothpro]

Hi! I have a template that works fine, I have downloaded it as an XML file and edited all instances of the name of the style subdirectory (e.g. images/mystyle/) to something different (e.g. images/mystyle2/)..this was done manually, one by one, using a find-replace in an xml editor

NOTHING else was changed

I have also, obviously, copied the images to the new directory

Much to my disappointment and disbelief, when I upload the new XML file there is no CSS?? it is just discarded like it wasn't there

Please notice I'm an experienced programmer with 4 years of php, mysql, html and css. so this really is unbelievable to me..why would changing the directory make the CSS invalid?

At first I thought my editor was invalidating the xml file by adding some whitespace but then I used a specific XML editor just to make sure, the file validates but still the CSS gets deleted when I re-upload the file

Any ideas?