When the merger of four long-established Tallinn schools gave birth to Tallinn Technology College (Techno TLN), one of Estonia’s largest educational institutions with nearly 6,000 students, a new unified website and e-shop was one of the most important parts of the school’s launch. The client had a Figma prototype and a clear vision. We were tasked with developing a mission-critical educational website that would function stably from the moment of launch and withstand the strain of the admissions campaign.
Client and project background
Techno TLN was born at the beginning of 2026, when Tallinn Lasnamäe Mechanical School, Tallinn Polytechnic, Tallinn Industrial Education Centre and Tallinn Construction School merged to form one technology college. The school opened its doors to new entrants on 1 March 2026 and offers technology-integrated secondary education, adult education and microcredentials in six fields of study:
- Digital and media technologies
- Electrotechnology
- Vehicle technology
- Industrial technology
- Construction technology
- Logistics and business processes
Learning takes place in four modern campuses across Tallinn: Mustamäe, Järvi, Lasnamäe and Kesklinna. The number of students is projected to grow to 10 000. The launch of the new school brand meant that techno.ee had to act from the moment of its opening as the main gateway to school life for enrolments, parents, partners and future staff.
The challenge: changing requirements and critical deadlines
The quote was based on an existing Figma prototype, but from the first weeks of the project the client’s requirements and content architecture started to change. The brand for the new school was still taking shape, the target audiences were being refined and the final texts were being finalised. At the same time, deadlines were very specific:
- By the end of January 2026, all the main data without eShop should be ready.
- By the end of February 2026, the e-shop functionality should be ready.
- On 23 March 2026, the full version of the page had to be live in order to open enrolment on 30 March 2026.
This was complemented by stringent technical requirements: the OWASP ASVS level 2 security requirements, WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility, E-ITS standard, Google Lighthouse 90+ point target score and a loading time of less than two seconds on the homepage. In other words, we needed a mission-critical website that would be stable and reliable from day one.
Solution: WordPress + WooCommerce, a custom theme and flexible content management
We chose a solution that gives the client as much autonomy as possible and allows them to react quickly to changing circumstances: WordPress with WooCommerce, hosted on Zone+’s smart cloud server, with Montonio integrated as a payment solution. There were three main reasons in favour of WordPress: comprehensive content management without the need to involve the developer in every change, open source flexibility, and an ecosystem that supports both future integrations with databases and a possible headless architecture.
Customized theme “tehnotln”, only the necessary functionality
Instead of a pre-purchased theme, we developed a fully custom WordPress theme for Techno TLN that includes only the functionality that the site actually uses. This keeps the codebase lighter and faster, gives a result in line with Figma’s design, and reduces dependency on third-party theme updates. The standard WooCommerce templates have also been rewritten within the theme to ensure a consistent user experience across the entire e-store, from product listing to checkout.
Customized Gutenberg blocks for content managers
To make sure the project could cope with changing requirements, we built our own Gutenberg block library for content managers. Each block performs a specific task: hero section, banners, CTA, gallery, accordion, FAQ, quotes, contacts, navigation, carousels, and different types of content such as news, events, curricula, feedback and user stories.
The key principle was that each block could be used on any page and in any order. The editor can assemble the page like Lego. On one page, the content starts with a hero block, on another with a text-and-picture combination, and on a third with a question block. New pages, events, curricula and landing pages can be created with the visual block editor without writing any code. Why a well-planned structure is the basis for a successful website is also explained in our guide to website planning.
My own calendar of events, because the off-the-shelf solutions did not give enough flexibility
One of the clearest specific requirements of Techno TLN was a rich calendar of events and activities. This had to include open days, career days, information days, training and partner events. We tested a number of ready-made calendar plug-ins, but none of them provided the desired flexibility in terms of layout, field structure, speakers or timetable organisation.
That’s why we built the calendar as a special solution. For each event, you can manage the header and cover image, the organiser, the address, the schedule, the list of performers and the ticket sales button. Events can be hidden, filtered and linked to different pages. The calendar is fully managed by the editor, just like the rest of the site.
Other key technical features
- Customized content types: events, fields of study, curricula, disciplines, campuses, staff, feedback and user stories. Each content type has its own set of ACF fields, making content entry easy and structured.
- WooCommerce e-shop for selling courses and training. Automatic discounted prices are applied to Techno TLN account holders who log in, and a customised checkout view makes the user journey clearer.
- Montonio payment solution with bank links, card payments and Apple Pay / Google Pay support, alongside PayPal.
- Internal search across all content types: news, curricula, events, staff and products.
- Multilingualism with WPML. The site is currently live in Estonian, but English support is built-in, including translators, e-shop and SEO metadata, and ready for activation.
- Role-based access management (Advanced Access Manager). Separate permissions for administrator, editor, author, SEO manager, store manager and client, so that each team member has exactly the access they need to get the job done.
- Edge-to-edge design on large monitors with proportionate text and image scales and lightly animated interface elements.
- Analytics: Google Analytics 4, Google Tag Manager and Meta/Facebook integration in the e-shop.
- Security and backup: Wordfence firewall and malware scanner, HTTPS, automatic daily backups, 2FA-based admin login, WordPress nonce-based CSRF protection, and input validation and cleanup to reduce the risk of XSS and SQL injection attacks.
- Performance optimisation: WP Rocket cache, EWWW Image Optimizer for automatic image optimisation and Zone+ cloud server fine-tuning.
Accessibility and performance that had to be met in a measurable way
As a public education website, techno.ee had to comply with WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility requirements and the Estonian Accessibility Act. This meant building forms, images, menus and interactions to work with screen readers, keyboards and high contrast modes.
On the performance side, the target was also clearly measurable, with a Google Lighthouse score of 90+ points and a loading time of less than 2 seconds for the main home page. We have written a separate article on the impact of website speed on customers and Google. In the case of Techno TLN, this meant automated optimisation of images, fine-tuning caching solutions and tuning Zone+ cloud server resources.
Result: deadlines met and measurements exceeded target
Despite changing requirements throughout the project, the website was completed on time. Development was done in iterative releases and the full version of the site (live 3.0) went live on 23 March 2026, giving the school the necessary readiness to open for enrolment on 30 March 2026. The site was able to steadily withstand the increased traffic of the enrolment campaign. The client strategically decided to move the public launch of the e-shop to a later phase, but technically it was operational by the agreed deadline.
Google Lighthouse measurements
- Performance: 91, target 90+ met
- Best practices: 100
- SEO: 92
- Accessibility: 91
- Core Web Vitals: passed, LCP 0,7 s, INP 44 ms, CLS 0,01
- First Contentful Paint: 0.6 s
- Time to First Byte: 0,2 s
- Total blocking time: 10 ms
The cooperation did not end with the launch of the website. Immediately after going live, the client commissioned an additional 120-150 hours of development and maintenance work to build the next stage of functionality. For us, this is an important recognition: the client saw value in the collaboration and wanted to continue.
On the whole, we are satisfied with the value of the work, the quality of the work, the smoothness of the cooperation and the fast, personal and professional approach throughout the process. Isn’t it true that with every new development there is always a ‘first time’? But within a week you have generally fixed everything that needs fixing.
Toivo Pärnpuu, Tallinn Polytechnic, Deputy Director for Development and Administration.
Project details
- Client: Tallinn Technology College (Techno TLN)
- Domain: educational website, vocational education and training
- Platform: WordPress + WooCommerce
- Server: zone+ smart cloud server
- Payment solution: Montonio
- Analytics: Google Analytics 4, Google Tag Manager.
- Services: website development, e-shop development, web design, content management, user training, maintenance.
- Implementation period: december 2025 – march 2026
- Team: project manager, front-end developer, back-end developer, client-side designer.
- Project Manager by Web Systems: Piret Sammel
- Website: techno.ee
When it comes to implementing similar ambitious projects, we stand by our clients’ side all the way: from website design and e-commerce development to web design, SEO services and long-term maintenance.