diff --git a/build-rootfs.sh b/build-rootfs.sh
index 24021db..d657f24 100755
--- a/build-rootfs.sh
+++ b/build-rootfs.sh
@@ -38,6 +38,9 @@ ${target}-emerge -vnj \
     sys-kernel/linux-firmware \
     --
 
+ROOT=/mnt/gentoo \
+locale-gen
+
 mkdir -p \
     /mnt/gentoo/boot/efi \
     /mnt/gentoo/dev \
diff --git a/overlay/etc/locale.conf b/overlay/etc/locale.conf
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..01ec548
--- /dev/null
+++ b/overlay/etc/locale.conf
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+LANG=en_US.UTF-8
diff --git a/overlay/etc/locale.gen b/overlay/etc/locale.gen
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a66d814
--- /dev/null
+++ b/overlay/etc/locale.gen
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8
diff --git a/portage/make.conf/40-lang.conf b/portage/make.conf/40-lang.conf
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0b0f27e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/portage/make.conf/40-lang.conf
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+LINGUAS=en
+L10N=en-US
+USE="${USE} -nls"