The dour assessment came right after Farfetch had spent $675 million to acquire New Guards Group, the parent company to Off-White, Palm Angels, and Heron Preston. Farfetch’s stock immediately went into a tailspin following the acquisition. The immediate concerns were twofold: that Fafetch was accumulating an unsustainable amount of debt, and that the company may have arrived to the Off-White party at an unsustainable peak. And though no one knew it at the time, an economy-devastating pandemic lingered on the horizon. An already weakened company like Farfetch should have been just another retail casualty.

But some eight months into general economic freefall—and a little more than a year removed from rumors of its imminent demise—Farfetch is thriving. And now, rather than fretting over revenue losses or a potential bankruptcy, CEO and founder José Neves is busy trying to figure out which Silicon Valley unicorn Farfetch has the most in common with. “You saw with Netflix: it started as an aggregator of other people's movies and eventually they figured out that if they really wanted to bring their platform to another level, they had to start to be an active participant in that culture,” Neves says. “The first 10 years of Farfetch, we've signed the most beautiful boutiques, 500 brands, we've created the logistics, the transaction engine, the platform to be able to offer this community access to a global consumer. But now is the time to become culturally relevant as a brand, not just as a transactional platform.

Because, when we first speak in February, Neves is pretty sure he's in charge of the next great digital company. He's just not sure which titan he wants to compare it to. Some days he’s helming the Pixar of high fashion: Farfetch’s acquisitions of Off-White parent company New Guards Group and the downtown shop Opening Ceremony enable it to churn out its own culture-moving creations. Others see it as the Amazon of high fashion, a cavernous and sprawling marketplace that offers free shipping on Rick Owens sneakers instead of mini waffle makers. (Pointedly, fashion remains the one area Amazon has been unable to crack.) Possibly, as one shop owner in Farfetch’s network says, the company is closer to the Uber of high fashion, harvesting the stock and hard work of the boutiques it works with to spin out big profits. But lately, during the pandemic, Neves has been seeing his baby more like Netflix. Both platforms started by compiling a vast catalog of others’ properties, but are now making a name for themselves by spending big to create their own original content. And like Netflix, Farfetch is making the most of a tough time: over the past several months, during a pandemic that’s kept people at home and shopping online, business has never been better.

During the pandemic, the site’s attracted 900,000 new customers, doubled app downloads, increased site traffic by 60% year over year, and brought revenue to $438 million in the latest quarter—a 71% increase compared to the same time last year. “In the western market, they're doing it the best,” says analyst Ed Yruma, a managing director at KeyBanc Capital Markets who covers Farfetch. Customers say that because of the pandemic they’re planning on doing more online shopping, even when we get to whatever our new post-vaccine normal looks like, according to a United Nations trade commission's survey. (Farfetch conducted its own survey among new customers, 45% of whom said they would do “more” shopping online now.) And in early November, the site received a combined $1.15 billion from luxury conglomerate Richemont and Alibaba, China’s version of Amazon. All of that seems to put Farfetch ahead of competitors like Net-a-Porter and the Amazon-owned Shopbop to be the one online retailer to rule them all. “[Farfetch is] in a position to lead the industry’s inevitable consolidation,” Lauren Sherman wrote in Business of Fashion.

The reversal of Farfetch’s fortunes has more to do with public opinion belatedly swinging Neves’s way than any major changes to the site’s strategy. Neves’s spending spree looks much better from a distance. New Guards Group will serve as Farfetch’s production studio, churning out luxury-grade pieces at fast-fashion speeds. The network of boutiques means the retailer doesn’t need to actually keep clothing in stock, removing it from the type of risk that gets even scarier in the middle of a pandemic. In January, NGG acquired Opening Ceremony, absorbing the former beloved retailer and remaking it as simply a brand. He acquired Stadium Goods to give Farfetch the ability to move secondary-market grail sneakers with the efficiency of a brand-new designer piece.