Hawthorn Trust Ireland - nonprofit website design for a Dublin-led charitable organisation

Hawthorn Trust Ireland is the Irish edition of our fictional donor-advised fund sponsor, run from 14 Merrion Square in Dublin and giving to charities in all 26 counties. It shares its twelve templates and design system with the US edition, but reads as an Irish charitable organisation: euros, Revenue Commissioners approval, CHY numbers, the Charities Regulator, GDPR consent with a Reject all button as prominent as Accept all, and a palette of forest, moss and clay.

Project facts

• Client: Hawthorn Trust Ltd, registered in Ireland (fictional)
• Sector: Philanthropy / Donor-advised funds
• Markets: Dublin plus donors and grants across all 26 counties
• Services: Market localisation · Copywriting · Brand adaptation · Nonprofit website design · Accessibility (WCAG 2.2 AA) · SEO foundations
• Templates: 12 page templates shared with every Hawthorn Trust edition
• Stack: Hand-built HTML, CSS and vanilla JavaScript; one strings file and one theme file per market

The brief

An Irish giving account site that never reads as American

The risk for an Irish edition is inheriting the US one: dollars, the IRS, 501(c)(3) status, state names. Hawthorn Trust Ireland keeps the warm editorial voice and swaps every institution, figure and place for an Irish one. A giving account is held at a charitable organisation (registered charity), grants go to Revenue Commissioners-approved charities, and the annual letter counts €5.2 billion in grants rather than dollars. Consent is opt-in under the GDPR and the ePrivacy Regulations, with Reject all as easy to find as Accept all.

Designing for Ireland

What actually changed between the US and this edition

• Story - US edition: Founded in the US, 27 markets · Ireland: Founded in Dublin in 1996 by three families and a single advisor
• Reach - US edition: Grants across all 50 states · Ireland: Grants to charities across all 26 counties
• Currency - US edition: $5.2 billion in grants · Ireland: €5.2 billion in grants; accounts from €5,000
• Regulator - US edition: IRS, 501(c)(3) · Ireland: Revenue Commissioners approval, CHY number, Charities Regulator
• Tax - US edition: US deduction limits · Ireland: Up to 60% of income for cash, 30% for appreciated assets, five-year carry-forward
• Contact - US edition: US regional map · Ireland: 14 Merrion Square, Dublin 2, D02 X285; +353 1 555 0142
• Consent - US edition: Notice banner · Ireland: Opt-in with Reject all as prominent as Accept all; DPC as regulator
• Look - US edition: Forest green, cream, terracotta, Fraunces · Ireland: Forest, moss and clay; Literata + Public Sans

Brand adaptation

The same Hawthorn Trust, with a local accent

Forest and moss carry the interface, with clay for action and gold for moments of celebration; every pairing is checked to WCAG AA. Literata replaces Fraunces as the headline serif, giving the pages a quieter, bookish tone, while Public Sans keeps forms and navigation plain. The seedling mark and the Giving that grows for generations line are unchanged.

Homepage and key journeys

The homepage opens on Muckross House in Killarney and the line Giving that grows for generations, then three counters restate the scale in euros. The Grants in Action carousel tells three Irish stories: early years classrooms in Cork (€2.4m), in-home visits for older people in Co. Galway (€860k) and 7,300 hectares of old-growth forest protected in Wicklow (€4.7m). The distinctive flow is the giving account page: Contribute, Invest, Recommend grants, with a comparison table against a private foundation and a minimum grant of €50.

Compliance, accessibility and trust

• Privacy notice under the GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018, naming Hawthorn Trust Ltd as controller, with the route to the Data Protection Commission.
• Cookie notice under the ePrivacy Regulations with opt-in consent and Reject all as prominent as Accept all.
• Footer with the CRO number and registered office at 14 Merrion Square, Dublin 2; 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 charitable foundation 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
• 27 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