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CARDIFF, Wales

WEB DESIGN CARDIFF

Cardiff websites answer to two languages and some of the strictest public-sector standards in the UK. Bilingual Welsh/English builds, accessible by default, publishing-ready for the capital's media and public bodies.

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The Cardiff Web Design Market

THE CARDIFF WEB DESIGN MARKET

Cardiff is a capital city, and its web design market reflects that: devolved government, public bodies, universities and the NHS in Wales sit alongside a genuine media cluster — BBC Cymru Wales and S4C at Central Square, plus the production companies around them. The defining feature of a Cardiff web brief is that it rarely involves just one audience, one language, or one standard.

Welsh changes everything about a build. Public bodies operate under Welsh Language Standards, which means a Welsh version of the site is a compliance matter, not a nice-to-have. But it goes beyond compliance: Welsh-speaking users notice — and judge — whether the Cymraeg version is a first-class citizen or an afterthought. A toggle that leads to half-translated pages does active reputational damage.

Then there's the media layer. Cardiff's broadcasters and publishers need editorial workflows — fast publishing, embargoes, video, high traffic around news moments — on platforms their newsrooms can actually operate. And beneath it all, the Bay's professional services, tourism and hospitality need what every city needs: sites that convert, in both languages.

What Cardiff Sites Need

WHAT CARDIFF SITES ACTUALLY NEED

Two languages, high standards, real accountability:

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TRUE BILINGUAL ARCHITECTURE
Parallel Welsh/English content with a proper language toggle, hreflang markup and equal depth on both sides — never machine translation dressed up as provision. The Cymraeg experience must be as complete as the English one, or don't ship it.
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ACCESSIBILITY, PROPERLY
WCAG 2.2 AA as the baseline for public-sector work — keyboard navigation, contrast, screen-reader structure, accessible PDFs and forms. Built in from the first wireframe, with an accessibility statement to publish at launch.
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PUBLISHING WORKFLOWS
Media and comms teams need to publish fast: clean editorial interfaces, embargo scheduling, video embedding that doesn't break the layout, and performance that holds under news-cycle traffic spikes.
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PROCUREMENT-READY DELIVERY
Public bodies buy through frameworks with evaluation criteria. We deliver to spec: documentation, handover, training and support SLAs as contract deliverables — and we're comfortable being measured against them.
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WELSH-LANGUAGE SEO
Welsh speakers search in Welsh. Cymraeg keyword research, bilingual URL structures and content that ranks in both languages — a genuinely under-served search landscape where good bilingual content wins quickly.

Our website development services cover the technical range behind bilingual and accessible builds.

Bilingual Build Decisions

GETTING BILINGUAL RIGHT

Where bilingual builds usually go wrong — and how we avoid it:

PARALLEL CONTENT, NOT MACHINE TRANSLATION

Every page exists in both languages, written or professionally translated — never auto-translated. For public bodies this is a compliance risk; for everyone else it's a trust issue. Welsh speakers can spot machine Welsh instantly.

URL STRUCTURE THAT SCALES

Clean language subdirectories (your-site.wales/cy/…) with hreflang annotations, so search engines serve the right language to the right user. Set once, correctly, at build time — retrofitting bilingual SEO is painful.

WHO WRITES THE WELSH

We architect the site and write the English; professional Welsh translators handle the Cymraeg, with a review workflow so your Welsh-speaking staff sign off before anything publishes. Translation is a content cost, scoped honestly upfront.

KEEPING PARITY OVER TIME

The classic failure: English pages updated, Welsh pages rotting. We build editorial workflows with parity checks — untranslated updates flagged, not silently published — so the Welsh site never becomes the embarrassing sibling.

The Cardiff–Manchester Relationship

FAR ENOUGH TO BE HONEST ABOUT IT

Plainly: one studio, at 174 Wilmslow Road in Manchester. No Cardiff office, and we won't pretend otherwise. Cardiff is a proper journey, so we're upfront about the working model: discovery and key design reviews happen in person (we travel), everything else runs on video with staging access throughout. For bilingual and public-sector builds this works well — structured reviews, written sign-offs, everything documented.

In exchange: senior designers and developers at Manchester overheads — below London rates, competitive with Cardiff agencies for equivalent seniority. Interactive work alongside the site: our Cardiff AR work. Everywhere we deliver is listed on our areas we cover hub.

Honest Pricing

PRICING, STATED PLAINLY

Pricing is per project, scoped in writing after discovery. The shape of it:

  • Single-language business sites: a defined-scope build, priced per project after a short scoping call.
  • Bilingual Welsh/English builds: the architecture plus a second content set — translation cost depends on volume and is scoped transparently.
  • Public-sector & media sites: accessibility, editorial workflows and documentation requirements scoped per project.
  • Website audit (UX, accessibility, SEO): a written report you keep, whether or not we do the rebuild.

Migration planning comes standard wherever rankings matter, staging access is yours throughout, and training is part of handover. Bilingual builds carry double the content workload — we plan the timeline around that openly, not hopefully.

FAQs

WEB DESIGN CARDIFF questions

Straight answers to what Cardiff organisations ask us most.

Do we legally need a Welsh version of our website?

If you're a public body in Wales, the Welsh Language Standards generally require Welsh-language provision — and a Welsh version of the site is expected, not optional. Private businesses aren't legally required, but bilingual provision is a commercial advantage in Wales and expected by many Welsh-speaking customers.

Can you just machine-translate our site into Welsh?

No — and we'd refuse the brief if that were the plan. Machine-translated Welsh reads as disrespectful to Welsh speakers and can be legally risky for public bodies. We build the bilingual architecture and work with professional Welsh translators for the content, with review workflows built in.

How much does a bilingual website cost in Cardiff?

We price per project, scoped in writing. Bilingual builds cost more than single-language ones — there's a second content set to create, translate and maintain — but the architecture work is a one-off and the translation cost depends on content volume. We'll scope both honestly.

What accessibility standard should our site meet?

Public sector bodies should meet WCAG 2.2 AA as a minimum and publish an accessibility statement. We build accessible from the start — keyboard navigation, contrast, screen-reader structure, accessible documents — and can support your accessibility audit and statement.

Do you work with public-sector procurement?

Yes. We're used to formal procurement: written specifications, evaluation criteria, documentation, handover and training as deliverables, and support arrangements defined in the contract. Tell us your framework and we'll work within it.

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Let's build a Cardiff site in both languages, properly

Straight answers on bilingual scope, accessibility and timeline — and an honest view on what your current site is missing.

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