Private counsel
Where strategy
meets legacy.
Discreet, high-touch counsel for athletes, performers, founders, and families at the decisions that define what comes next. We do not chase volume. We take on a select number of relationships, stay with them for years, and build structures that last.
Practice
Counsel built around how you build, compete, and protect.
Family Office & Trustee Services
Trustee Services · Estate Administration · Family GovernanceLegal counsel and fiduciary partner to family offices and their principals. Through Lake Legal and our affiliated advisory practice, Lake Advisors, we provide trustee services, estate administration, family governance, and entity design, coordinated across your legal, tax, and investment teams and adapted as circumstances and people change.
Corporate & Entity Formation
LLC Formation · Operating Agreements · GovernanceFor founders and ventures whose structure should match their ambition. How a business is owned and governed, how partners share control and profit, how equity vests, and how the contracts that run the company hold up under pressure.
Securities & Capital Raises
Reg D · PPM Drafting · EDGAR Filings · Fund ComplianceCapital raises handled with precision: Reg D offerings, private placement memoranda, Form D and EDGAR filings, subscription agreements, and waterfall mechanics. A clean, defensible raise with terms an investor can read and trust.
Sports & Entertainment
NIL · Endorsements · Film & TV · Brand LicensingFrom NIL strategy and endorsements to motion picture agreements and media rights: structures that protect your name, your intellectual property, and your future, negotiated with an eye on the long arc, not just the deal in front of you.
Grant Administration & USDA Programs
USDA Programs · Compliance · Subrecipient AgreementsRepresenting federal grant recipients through the full life of an award: administration, compliance and reporting, subrecipient agreements, and the entity structures that hold and operate the program.
Selective by design. Undivided attention, deeper counsel, judgment that compounds.
Philosophy
A strategic partner.
Not just a law firm.
Lake Legal was built for the moments that set a course: athletes stepping into the spotlight, families crossing a generational transition, founders turning a personal brand into a lasting enterprise. Here the legal decisions are inseparable from the personal ones, and a single document can shape a family or a career for decades.
We give counsel with clarity, discretion, and the long view. We work with a select group of clients facing consequential decisions, helping them protect what they have built and pass it on intact. This is counsel, not a transaction. It takes a lawyer who carries the full context and gives every decision the time it deserves.
Counsel
Ryan Lake
Founder & Managing Attorney J.D., LL.M., MBA
Ryan founded Lake Legal in 2012 and has spent his career where law, identity, and long-term strategy meet: advising athletes, performers, founders, and families. He teaches sports and business law at the University of Denver and has written on the business of sport for Forbes.
Read full profile →Who We Serve
People whose name, brand, or legacy is at stake.
Families & Private Clients
For families whose wealth has outgrown a single advisor and now reaches across entities, properties, and the next generation. Long-term counsel on governance, structure, and succession, coordinated with your existing advisors.
Athletes & Performers
The moment your name holds value, you need structure. NIL strategy, brand licensing, entity formation, endorsements, and long-term asset protection, with an eye on the years after the spotlight as much as the deal in front of you.
Creators & Founders
The audience you build is an asset, and it deserves the same care as any other. We protect intellectual property, structure ventures, and make sure ownership, control, and upside stay with you as the work scales.
Begin a conversation
We would welcome hearing from you.
We work with a select number of clients over the long term. If you are facing a situation where discretion, structure, and experienced counsel matter, reach out.
Denver, Colorado • By appointment