Solas Ireland - early learning website design for a Dublin childcare group

Solas Ireland is the Irish edition of our fictional Nordic-inspired early learning group, with its flagship campus in Ranelagh, Dublin. It shares every template with the US and UK editions but reads as Irish: crèche and childcare rather than preschool, junior infants rather than reception, euro fees, the Data Protection Commission and a palette of moss, sea glass and amber.

Project facts

• Client: Solas Early Learning Ltd, registered in Ireland (fictional)
• Sector: Early years education · Crèche and childcare
• Markets: Dublin plus campuses along the east coast
• Services: Market localisation · Copywriting · Brand adaptation · Early learning website design · Accessibility (WCAG 2.2 AA) · SEO foundations
• Templates: 15 page templates shared with every Solas Early Learning edition
• Stack: Hand-built HTML, CSS and vanilla JavaScript; one strings file and one theme file per market

The brief

An Irish childcare site that never reads as British

The biggest risk for an Irish edition is inheriting the UK one: Ofsted, pounds, reception class. Solas Ireland keeps British spelling but replaces every place, fee and institution with an Irish one: crèche and childcare, junior infants, the HSE and Tusla, euro fees and Dublin neighbourhoods.

Designing for Ireland

What actually changed between the US and this edition

• Story - US edition: Founded in Portland's Pearl District · Ireland: Flagship campus in Ranelagh, Dublin
• Programmes - US edition: Preschool, kindergarten · Ireland: Crèche, childcare, junior infants
• Fees - US edition: Monthly tuition in dollars · Ireland: Monthly fees in euro
• Institutions - US edition: US licensing boards · Ireland: Tusla Early Years Inspectorate, HSE
• Legal - US edition: US privacy law and state rights · Ireland: GDPR with the Data Protection Commission; opt-in consent
• Look - US edition: Oat, clay, ochre, moss, spruce; Fraunces + Alegreya Sans · Ireland: Sea mist, moss green and amber; Literata + Public Sans

Brand adaptation

The same Solas Early Learning, with a local accent

Moss green carries the interface on a soft sea-mist ground, with amber for warmth and action; a deep coastal teal takes the dark panels, and every pairing passes WCAG AA. Literata gives headlines a bookish, storytelling tone and Public Sans keeps forms plain. The Early Learning descriptor stays with the wordmark.

Homepage and key journeys

The hero opens on outdoor play with A gentler, braver kind of early learning. The editorial long scroll restates the philosophy, programmes by age from the baby room to junior infants, family stories from Ranelagh and Dublin's east coast, and nearby campuses. The distinctive flow is the four-step online application with a refundable registration fee requested once the campus confirms a place.

Compliance, accessibility and trust

• Privacy notice under the GDPR naming Solas Early Learning Ltd (registered in Ireland) as controller, with the route to the Data Protection Commission.
• Cookie consent with Reject all as prominent as Accept all.
• Footer with an Irish company line; no UK regulators such as Ofsted or the ICO.
• 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 an early-learning provider 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 15 templates, header, footer and forms
• Brand adaptation: palette, type pairing and logo descriptor
• 22 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