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Two languages or five

A website in several languages is a content problem before it's a translation problem.

Most multilingual sites fail quietly: one language falls behind, a page exists in English but not in German, the menu is translated and the PDFs aren't, and the team stops trusting the site. The fix isn't more translation. It's a structure that makes it hard to fall behind.

Start a projectSee multilingual work

Who you'll be working with.

I'm Frederico Leonardo, a senior web developer in Lisbon, Portugal. I've designed and built sites in five languages with 2,000+ articles, two-language institutional sites, and moved multilingual sites between platforms. I work in English and Portuguese, which helps: I've been the editor on the other side of the CMS.

More about me

How a multilingual site gets built

  1. 01

    Which content is really multilingual.

    Not everything needs every language. We decide what is translated, what is shared and what stays in one language, before building.

  2. 02

    A content model that carries languages.

    In Craft CMS: sites and propagation rules, so a new article exists in every language it should, with the right fallbacks. In Webflow: Localization, when the site is small enough for it.

  3. 03

    An editorial workflow.

    Who translates, how missing translations are flagged, what visitors see while a translation is pending.

  4. 04

    URLs, hreflang and search.

    One URL per language, correct alternates, sitemaps per language, so each market finds its own version.

  5. 05

    Design that survives translation.

    German is a third longer than English. Portuguese wraps differently. The layouts are tested with real translated content, not with lorem ipsum.

Craft CMS or Webflow for several languages?

Craft CMS

Best for
3+ languages, lots of content, editors who translate every week
Cost
Licence, no per-language pricing
Workflow
Propagation, fallbacks, per-field translation
Watch out for
Needs a developer to set up properly

Proof

Multilingual projects

Frederico is a kind of haute couture tailor for the digital age. His rigour, knowledge and refined aesthetic sense are always in service of a clear, effective message. Our goal is to position Center of Portugal in international markets with clarity and a voice of its own. I know nothing about code, so watching him strip the noise from page after page feels almost like magic.

Marli MonteiroExecutive Director · ARPT Centro de Portugal

What it costs

Languages can share the same content model and templates, and the quote still accounts for translated content, URL structure, editorial workflows, migration and testing in each language. Translation is separate: your team can provide it, or we can agree another workflow with human review. Indicative project budgets are on the pricing page.

Pricing & Process

Working on a client project?

I work white-label or alongside your agency, from the pitch to long after launch. You keep the client and I answer for the technical side. At handover, the code goes to your client.

How I work with agencies

FAQ

Answers before you get in touch.

Can we add a language later?

Yes, if the site was built for it. That's the point of doing the content model first.

Do you translate?

No. The translations come from your team, or we use AI and your team reviews it. I set up the structure and the workflow so either way works inside the CMS.

What about right-to-left languages?

Craft CMS handles them. The design has to be planned for it. Tell me early.

Will each language rank in its own market?

That's what hreflang, per-language URLs and sitemaps are for. It's part of every multilingual build.

Can you migrate our multilingual site to a new CMS?

Yes. See CMS migration.

Next step

Tell me which languages, and how much content.

Send the context and I'll reply, usually within one working day, with a few questions.

Schedule a free 30-minute call