New Farfetch campus will be a “masterpiece”

In order to complete the project of the future Farfetch campus in Matosinhos, six national and international architecture offices have been selected by the company. Both projects are expected to contain three elements: technology, wellbeing and sustainability. “We want this project to be in harmony with nature, obviously elegant, but essentially a place where you can find tranquillity and calmness to perform your activities at full capacity.”, Luís Teixeira, Farfetch’s Managing-Director, told ECO.

Among different ideas, Farfetch organised a shortlist of architects, with whom an internal and an external team are working. “It will be a huge project”, Luís said. “The first list of architects has been presented to us. After shortlisting it, we have now chosen the architects that will go to the final competition. Among the six architects selected, some are well-renowned, national and international, and others are not that well-known, because we want to give them that opportunity to grow with us, just like we have grown over the last decade. We believe this can be a good opportunity for someone who can bring something new.”

The project that has neither an expected date to start nor to be completed will be done with all Farfetch workers in mind and it will be based on the idea of “creating a milestone for the community that is also a masterpiece”. Above all, they expect to be a new home open to the future.

“This was the right moment to think about what is going to become of our home for the present and for the future. We invested in a land slot that will allow us to build about 70,000 square meters. We do not need them right now, but they will allow us to expand in the future. There was no single doubt that we would keep investing in Portugal and for those who doubted, here’s the proof.” However, Luís wishes, this time, for the growth to be slower than what has been so far.

On the 9th of April, Farfetch announced the acquisition of a land slot in Matosinhos, where the unicorn wants to create the biggest tech innovation and logistical centre of the company. It will host more than 2,000 workers that are now working in their offices in Portugal and abroad. The investment will be of about 15M€ and the project will contemplate the creation of offices, logistics, digital production studios and set of equipment that will make this space a national reference.” Farfetch said in a statement.

Expectations? Luís assures that he ” has no idea about what is going to be”, especially because he wants to give that creative freedom to the proposals. “We don’t want to kill creativity. We want this to be iconic and the truth is we are a bit anxious to know the final result. But, today, in Portugal, we have already six offices and one of the biggest challenges is to make sure that people will always have the best conditions possible to work in this accelerated growth.” Luís Teixeira went as far as to stress that they “want the campus to be a place where people enjoy working and where, ultimately, they would like to live in”.