Haddad & Thorne UAE - law firm website design for a DIFC practice

Haddad & Thorne FZ-LLC is a 230-lawyer firm with five UAE offices, founded in DIFC, Dubai in 1987 and now spanning Abu Dhabi, Dubai Marina, Business Bay and Sharjah. The edition is written in English with British spelling, as the market is, and speaks its legal language: DIFC Courts and UAE practice, the Securities and Commodities Authority, foreign investment screening, and deals priced in AED. It follows the UAE PDPL and DIFC DP Law 2020.

Project facts

• Client: Haddad & Thorne FZ-LLC (fictional)
• Sector: Corporate law firm
• Markets: DIFC, Dubai; Abu Dhabi; Dubai Marina; Business Bay; Sharjah, plus a global network of counsel
• Services: Market localisation · Copywriting · Brand adaptation · Law firm website design · Accessibility (WCAG 2.2 AA) · SEO foundations
• Templates: 12 page templates shared with every Haddad & Thorne edition
• Stack: Hand-built HTML, CSS and vanilla JavaScript; one strings file and one theme file per market

The brief

Editorial, warm and built to scale across offices

UAE clients instruct by practice and by office, and many deals cross the Middle East, Europe and Asia. The site keeps the US system's twelve templates and one component library, but the firm story now starts in DIFC in 1987 with four partners, the people grid filters by UAE office, and the M&A page adds foreign investment screening and multi-jurisdictional coordination. The voice stays formal and warm; imagery is regional and modest.

Designing for the UAE

What actually changed between the US and this edition

• Entity - US edition: Haddad & Thorne LLP · United Arab Emirates: Haddad & Thorne FZ-LLC
• Story - US edition: US firm, 230+ lawyers, 5 offices · United Arab Emirates: Founded in DIFC, Dubai in 1987 with four partners; 230 lawyers across five UAE offices
• Offices - US edition: New York, Washington, D.C., San Francisco · United Arab Emirates: DIFC, Dubai; Abu Dhabi; Dubai Marina; Business Bay; Sharjah
• Addresses - US edition: Street address and ZIP · United Arab Emirates: Office 1402, Gate Avenue, DIFC, Dubai, PO Box 12345; +971 4 555 0100
• Practice detail - US edition: US deal coordination · United Arab Emirates: Foreign investment screening and coordination across the Middle East, Europe and Asia
• People - US edition: Attorneys by US office · United Arab Emirates: Partners and counsel by UAE office, including a counsel in Sharjah and an associate in Abu Dhabi
• Credentials - US edition: State bar admissions · United Arab Emirates: Legal practice admissions; Chambers UAE Band 1, DIFC Corporate/M&A (2023–2026)
• Deals - US edition: US dollar values · United Arab Emirates: AED 7.7B take-private of a logistics platform
• Community - US edition: US pro bono · United Arab Emirates: Legal aid clinic for small business owners in Al Quoz; youth mentorship nonprofit in Jumeirah
• Legal - US edition: US privacy and bar notes · United Arab Emirates: UAE PDPL and DIFC DP Law 2020 consent; trade licence in the footer

Brand adaptation

The same Haddad & Thorne, with a local accent

Warm paper and deep ink carry the interface, with a brass accent for eyebrows, numbers and hovers and a deeper brass on dark panels. Cormorant gives headlines, quotes, accordion triggers and the wordmark a grand editorial voice; Manrope keeps body copy, buttons and forms crisp. Corners stay at 1px for a tailored feel, and the wordmark keeps Haddad & Thorne with the FZ-LLC entity in the footer.

Homepage and key journeys

A full-bleed hero over the Dubai Frame opens the site, followed by the firm-stats split (230 lawyers, five UAE offices), a practice-area preview grid, a dark testimonial band with a regional technology group's general counsel, a people preview and an insights preview, each revealing on scroll. The distinctive flow is the office filter: people and offices are grouped by DIFC, Abu Dhabi, Dubai Marina, Business Bay and Sharjah, so a visitor can move from a city to its partners, its leadership and its local news without leaving the template.

Compliance, accessibility and trust

• Privacy policy under the UAE Personal Data Protection Law and DIFC DP Law 2020, with a dismissible consent bar that persists its state locally.
• Footer with the demo trade licence number for Haddad & Thorne FZ-LLC, Dubai, plus Privacy policy and Terms.
• Legal practice admissions stated per lawyer under DIFC Courts and UAE practice; no US state bar claims.
• Passes automated WCAG 2.2 AA checks on every page at 360, 390, 768 and 1440 px: no contrast failures, no unreachable controls, no horizontal scrolling.
• A language switcher built from hreflang sits in the header on desktop and in the footer on phones.

One system, twelve markets

Every visible string lives in one file per market, and every colour and typeface in one theme file. This edition needed no new templates or components: a strings file, a theme, regional photography and local legal content made it a different brand experience. For a law firm with international plans, a new market becomes a content project rather than a rebuild.

Deliverables

• Market profile: language, formats, legal and seasonality
• Full localised copy across 12 templates, header, footer and forms
• Brand adaptation: palette, type pairing and logo descriptor
• 28 regional photographs (Pexels, credited in credits.json)
• Local legal content
• Accessibility pass (WCAG 2.2 AA, automated) and QA at four screen widths
• Portfolio media: stills, full-page captures, scroll video, OG image, brand board