Groundwell Ireland: civil tech website and design system for infrastructure software

Groundwell Ireland is the Irish edition of our fictional civil tech brand, with its registered office at 14 Merrion Square, Dublin 2. It shares every template with the US and UK editions, but reads as an Irish firm: euros with VAT at 23%, kilometres and tonnes, TII and local authorities, GDPR with the Data Protection Commission, and a palette drawn from stone, sage and coastal light.

Project facts

• Client: Groundwell Ltd, registered in Ireland (fictional)
• Sector: Civil engineering, heavy civil construction, geospatial software
• Markets: Dublin plus projects across all 32 counties
• Services: Market localisation · Copywriting · Brand adaptation · Civic tech website design · Accessibility (WCAG 2.2 AA) · SEO foundations
• Templates: 8 page templates shared with every Groundwell edition
• Stack: Hand-built HTML, CSS and vanilla JavaScript; one strings file and one theme file per market

The brief

An Irish civil tech site that never reads as American

The biggest risk for an Irish edition is inheriting the US one: dollars, state DOTs, miles and OSHA. Groundwell Ireland keeps British spelling and metric units throughout, and replaces every institution, place and legal reference with an Irish one. Engineers search by county and Eircode, procurement asks about framework agreements and EU data centres, and the legal copy names the Data Protection Commission and Irish law.

Designing for Ireland

What actually changed between the US and this edition

• Story - US edition: Founded in Golden, Colorado; 48 states · Ireland: Started with a total station and a van in Dublin; 32 counties
• Projects - US edition: I-70 Corridor · CO; Juniper Valley · OR; Northfork Line · WA; Cedar River Crossing · IA · Ireland: M50 Corridor · Dublin; Lee Valley · Cork; DART Line · Dublin; Barrow Crossing · Kildare
• Institutions - US edition: State DOTs, EPA, OSHA, FAA · Ireland: Local authorities and TII, EPA Ireland, HSA, IAA
• Units - US edition: Miles, feet, tons, US customary · Ireland: Kilometres, metres, tonnes, metric throughout
• Currency - US edition: $1,450 · Ireland: €468 (excl. VAT); VAT at 23% calculated at checkout
• Pricing - US edition: Annual/monthly toggle in dollars · Ireland: Euro pricing with bank transfer and purchase order; framework agreements for public bodies
• Legal - US edition: US terms, state privacy rights · Ireland: Irish law, GDPR with the Data Protection Commission, EU data centres by default
• Contact - US edition: US phone and addresses · Ireland: +353 1 555 0190; 14 Merrion Square, Dublin 2, D02 X285
• Event - US edition: US user conference · Ireland: Baseline 2027 at Convention Centre Dublin, 18–20 May 2027; €250K prize
• Look - US edition: Forest ink, concrete paper, survey-marker orange; Fraunces + Public Sans + IBM Plex Mono · Ireland: Ink and paper with sage, steel and amber; Public Sans throughout

Brand adaptation

The same Groundwell, with a local accent

The palette comes from Irish stone, sage and coastal light rather than the default tech blue. Ink and paper carry the interface; amber marks action and emphasis; sage and steel ground dark panels and data sections. Public Sans is used for both headlines and body, giving the site a plain, civic tone suited to public works. The wordmark keeps the survey crosshair and benchmark triangle, and the Groundwell name is unchanged.

Homepage and key journeys

The hero opens on the Four Courts along the Liffey with The ground truth for Irish infrastructure. and coordinates 53.3498° N · 6.2603° W. Proof points are restated for Ireland (32 counties active projects, local authorities and TII using Span, tonnes of embodied carbon avoided). The industries carousel, impact stats, product trio, AI banner, tabbed customer stories and partner marquee follow the US structure. The distinctive flow is the project story tabs, which switch between the M50 Corridor, Lee Valley, DART Line and Barrow Crossing in place, each with a metric result and a link to the full case study.

Compliance, accessibility and trust

• Privacy notice under the GDPR naming Groundwell Ltd (registered in Ireland) as controller, with the route to the Data Protection Commission.
• Cookie policy with opt-in consent and a Reject all button as prominent as Accept all.
• Software support and maintenance terms governed by the laws of Ireland, with fees payable annually in advance in euro.
• Accessibility statement and footer with Irish company and VAT numbers; no US regulators or schemes.
• 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 civic-tech company 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 8 templates, header, footer and forms
• Brand adaptation: palette, type pairing and logo descriptor
• 37 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