Full Description
Legal design is no longer a niche concept but a growing movement reshaping how legal services are delivered, understood, and experienced. While discussions around innovation in law have gained momentum, meaningful adoption often lags behind ambition. Many legal professionals recognize the need for transformation but struggle to integrate a prototype-driven and interdisciplinary approach into their working environments.
This book bridges the gap between theory and execution, offering a comprehensive guide to implementing legal design in law firms, legal departments, institutions, and other legal service environments. From exploring user-centered approaches to structuring design-driven processes, it provides actionable insights into how legal design can enhance clarity, accessibility, and efficiency in legal services.
Drawing on extensive experience in legal design, innovation, and transformation, this book blends strategic vision with hands-on experience. It goes beyond high-level discussions to address the real-world challenges of integrating legal design thinking into legal practice, whether that means overcoming organizational resistance, aligning stakeholders, or proving the value of legal design to decision makers. It also offers practical tools and frameworks to navigate the hidden complexities of legal design projects, ensuring that design-driven change is not only embraced but sustained.
Whether you're just starting your journey in legal design or already working on innovation projects, this book serves as a practical resource that you can revisit as challenges and opportunities arise. By blending theory with real-world application, it provides a roadmap for making legal design a fundamental and effective part of legal practice.
Contents
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
About the author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
By Heidi Gardner
Introduction: Why this book? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii
Part I: Ontology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Introduction to Part I: Opening the Door . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Chapter 1: So, this is legal design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Law and the Oral-B toothbrush . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
A definition (or many definitions?) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
What legal design is not . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
A panacea for all evil? Well, no... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
A global movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Prototyping in the legal world . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
The legal designer -a new job? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
When law firms offer legal design services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Chapter 2: Principles of legal design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Why do we need to speak about principles? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Principle 1: Human-centrism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Principle 2: Co-creation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Principle 3: Diversity and inclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Principle 4: A non-hierarchical approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Principle 5: Process first . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Principle 6: Divergence and convergence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Principle 7: Fail fast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Principle 8: How might we? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Principle 9: Productification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Principle 10: KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid!) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Principle 11: Dignity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Principle 12: + 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Future principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Chapter 3: The why of legal design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
New context, new demand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
A form of innovation - or innovations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
The legal experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
The illusion of reading (legal) texts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
F-patterns and scanning - how we actually read . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
A neurological case for legal design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
A nudging law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Is legal design just for B2C? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Chapter 4: Abandoning the legalese - communicating plain . . . . . . . . . 45
A quick introduction to plain language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
What does it mean to communicate clearly? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Benefits of clarity and comprehension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
The plain language ISO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
A world in emojis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Notes about inclusive language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
The intercultural factor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Thoughtful perspective: Michael Doherty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Part II: Legal Design and... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Introduction to Part II: Beyond Legal Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Chapter 5: Legal design and other designs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Legal design vs... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Legal design or contract design? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Chapter 6: Legal design and sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Legal design and the United Nations 2030 Agenda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Enhancing accessibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
About clear communication as human right . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Legal design and neurodiversity, part one - designing for a neurodiverse audience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Legal design and neurodiversity part two - when the legal designer is neurodivergent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Redesigning governance towards transparency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Chapter 7: Legal design and artificial intelligence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
The evolution of legal design with generative AI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
From design thinking to emerging thinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
How about AI as final user? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Thinking before building . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Ethical considerations and challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Chapter 8: Legal design and dark patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
What is a dark pattern? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Dark patterns in practice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Why legal design is important for dark patterns (and potential related risks) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
Chapter 9: Legal design and proactive law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
What is proactive law? Evolutions and significance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Benefits of proactive law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Five main barriers to proactive law and potential pathways to success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
Legal design and proactive law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
Chapter 10: Legal design and gamification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
A quick intro to gamification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
Gamification in the legal field - strategies and applications . . . . . . . . . 116
Challenges and ethical considerations of gamification in the legal field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
A virtual legal experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Legal design and gamification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Thoughtful perspective: Ashleigh Ruggles and Maclen Stanley . . . . . . 125
Part III: From Theory to Practice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Introduction to Part III: Law and Ikea Instructions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Chapter 11: Setting the stage for our legal design project . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Choosing the format, part one - online, in person, or hybrid? . . . . . . . 133
Choosing the format, part two - hackathons, jams, and periodic sessions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Choosing the format, part three - parallel, serial, or both? . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Preparing a legal design project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
Involving the right players and creating an inclusive environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Developing a preliminary checklist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Creating common knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Chapter 12: The legal design toolbox . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
The platforms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Sticky pads, pins, markers, boards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Most common visual tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Patterns libraries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Tools for law firms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Readability tests and software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
An always evolving scenario . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
Chapter 13: 12 challenges of a legal design project (and tips to overcome them) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
Challenge 1: Is this thing valid? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
Challenge 2: Budget . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
Challenge 3: Internal selling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Challenge 4: Managing time constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
Challenge 5: Quantifying benefits - measuring what's often hidden . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Challenge 6: Avoid deviating from the original project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Challenge 7: The Tetris agenda - balancing competing priorities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Challenge 8: Navigating interdisciplinary teamwork . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Challenge 9: Establishing a structured framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
Challenge 10: Different clients, different organizations, different processes - adapting to varied needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Challenge 11: The smartest ones in the room . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Challenge 12: Modification and editability of legal design outputs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
Chapter 14: 12 tips for great legal design sessions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
Tip 1: Don't let equity partners and general counsels run the show . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
Tip 2: Manage interruptions wisely . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
Tip 3: Be cautious with recording sessions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Tip 4: Use of AI tools for minutes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Tip 5: Assign homework duties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Tip 6: Adopt forward, not backward thinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
Tip 7: Rely on evangelists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . 179
Tip 8: Maintain an informal approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Tip 9: Less words, more practice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Tip 10: Celebrate small wins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Tip 11: Manage cognitive load . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Tip 12: Defer judgment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Chapter 15: The 12 most common mistakes in legal design (AKA the best lessons I've learned) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
Mistake 1: Thinking you know the user . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
Mistake 2: Considering the contract out of its system . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
Mistake 3: Raising excessive expectations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Mistake 4: Expecting legal design to fix everything . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Mistake 5: Losing the initial enthusiasm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Mistake 6: Treating documents as static artefacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
Mistake 7: Assuming our documents are already good enough . . . . . . 191
Mistake 8: Jumping directly to the solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
Mistake 9: Lack of interdisciplinary collaboration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Mistake 10: Downplaying resistance to change within legal teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Mistake 11: Underestimating regulatory and ethical considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
Mistake 12: Treating legal design as a one-time effort . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
Chapter 16: Practical applications of AI for legal design projects . . . . . 197
Choosing the right engine - a short guide to AI tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
Building with the machine - prototyping in practice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
From drafting to conversating - specific uses of AI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
More tools, better questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Chapter 17: Leveraging on the learning experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
Gathering feedback and listening for learning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
Maintaining momentum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
After the project is done - turning (more) ideas into action . . . . . . . . . 205
Thoughtful perspective: Sally Guyer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
Part IV: The Leonardo Framework© . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
Introduction to Part IV: Towards a Common Ground . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213
Chapter 18: The Leonardo Framework© . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Some disclaimers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
How about three levels of legal design? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 216
Level 1: The base of the pyramid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
Level 2: The magic of legal design thinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
Level 3: Metricizing the law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Chapter 19: Level 1 of the Leonardo Framework© . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Preamble - always users first . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Step 1: Look. Read. Listen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Step 2: Clarifying the language, part one - things to avoid . . . . . . . . . . . 228
Step 3: Clarifying the language, part two - things to do . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Step 4: A matter of how . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Step 5: Refining our typography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
Thinking in terms of information architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
Chapter 20: Level 2 of the Leonardo Framework© . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
From Level 1 to Level 2 - from intervention to intention . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
Step 1: What do we want to achieve? What impact do we want to have? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
Step 2: Empathize . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
Step 3: Define . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Step 4: Ideate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
Step 5: Prototype . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
Step 6: Test . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
Step 7: Refining our work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
Chapter 21: Level 3 of the Leonardo Framework© . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
From Level 2 to Level 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Why we need to measure impact . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
Working towards an impact analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
Reflections about scalability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 266
Delving into A/B testing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
The measure of maturity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
Three levels and Dante's Paradise . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
Thoughtful perspective: Matthew Butterick . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
Chapter 22: Conclusion - Legal Design and the Ikigai a pathway to holistic fulfilment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
About Globe Law and Business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
