Weekend Interview: Wildflower's Adam Gordon On Partnering With Robert De Niro And Raising Wagyu

This series goes deep with some of the most compelling figures in commercial real estate: the dealmakers, the game-changers, the city-shapers and the larger-than-life personalities who keep CRE interesting.

Curiosity may have killed the cat, but it’s what made Adam Gordon a successful businessman.

The fourth-generation New Yorker is the managing partner of Wildflower Ltd. His career has gone from interning on Wall Street and flipping homes to being one of Amazon’s largest real estate partners and selling an electric vehicle charging site to Tesla.

His latest venture is Wildflower Studios, a 760K SF vertical media production facility in Queens, developed in partnership with actor Robert De Niro.

The film studio comes as part of a production boom for New York City. 

Earlier this week, Bungalow Projects, alongside private equity firm Bain Capital, filed plans to build a 300K SF studio in Bushwick. The partners have another facility in the works in Red Hook. 

On Manhattan’s West Side, Vornado Realty Trust, Blackstone and Hudson Pacific Properties are investing $350M in a public-private partnership to build Sunset Pier 94 Studios. In New Jersey, Netflix is moving forward on a 289-acre, $903M production complex.

But Gordon shrugs that competition off, calling the people behind those projects “colleagues and comrades.”

“I'm not focused first on profit,” Gordon said. “Profit is there because it's business, and I'm comfortable in that realm.”

Instead, Gordon, an environmentalist, is more focused on exploring new technologies and new fascinations, including on the West Coast, where Gordon’s personal projects are concentrated.

Gordon served on the directors’ council at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and helped develop the institution’s 100-year plan. He also owns Knights Valley Wagyu, one of the few ranches raising wagyu cattle in the U.S.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Bisnow: You’ve done everything from residential townhouses to Amazon warehouses to solar projects. Where do you get the inspiration for such a wide range of projects?

Gordon: I look and see if I have a voice, if it's important and if it's interesting to me. 

Living in New York City is this opportunity to be, in ecological terms, in the ecotone. It's where multiple ecosystems meet. When you go to the beach and where the waves meet the sand, that's where all the shells wash up. When I think about the city, I think about constant evolution and this dynamic place where people are coming from all over the world to express themselves, to excel and to contribute. I want to do my part. 

All of it is within that frame. I don't really think of myself as an expert in one discipline. I really think of myself as somebody who wants to explore and contribute to the built community in New York City. 

For example, we're developing the largest EV charging station in New York City near JFK Airport because it was a need. We had a particular set of skills, working with Amazon and my work at Scripps Institution of Oceanography on their 100-year campus master plan. And so we did it.

Bisnow: You told me that you were exploring the possibility of building the largest 3D-printed building in the world. What other disruptors are you interested in? 

Gordon: I'm pretty intellectually fearless, meaning that if I feel like something is helpful, appropriate and timely, even if we're ahead of a curve, I'll dive in. Conversely, when I don't have anything to say that's novel or useful, I'll stop. 

We built Amazon's first modern, multistory e-commerce warehouse in New York City. I could do many more here and elsewhere, but many people have entered the business, and I don't think I have anything particularly useful or novel to say anymore. So we stopped.

We will likely be in housing at some point. When you look at the social and economic challenges facing New Yorkers, working-class New Yorkers, in particular, they all stem back to housing. What we need to do is work through a combination of technology and politics in order to bring large-scale housing to New York City.

Bisnow: Your latest venture is Wildflower Studios with De Niro. What led to this project in the first place?

Gordon: It started with a knock on the door. People wanted to rent warehouses we own for productions. After a few knocks, I went to see Robert, and we began discussing physical production. It turned out that he had long had an interest in the space. 

When we began researching, I found that there wasn't a lot of thought that went into most production facilities. I felt like there was room to innovate in a positive way and have technologically friendly, high-performance production spaces. 

I also started to realize that Hollywood was a place. It was Los Angeles and the movie studios with their enormous lots where content was filmed, but it has evolved into an approach which no longer relies on one place.

Bisnow: How are you thinking about the challenges that production giants are facing right now? Hollywood’s slowing after the strikes, Paramount is shutting down its TV studio and had to make layoffs, and it, along with Warner Bros., had to take write-downs. 

Gordon: These tech companies are among the most innovative in the world, and we feel at home with them, producing spaces that they understand. They're not bound by history. 

So much of Hollywood is nostalgia. People are concerned about AI instead of seeing AI as a tool. People are concerned about the death of the big-screen theater experience instead of heralding the small screen where we all watch Netflix or Amazon in the evening. 

The screens are getting smaller, but the appetites around the world are growing.

Bisnow: On the opposite side of the country, you own Knights Valley Wagyu. That seems like quite a niche hobby. How did you get into that?

Gordon: When we bought our ranch in wine country, it was for a number of reasons. First, it was a place that we always wanted to come back to and felt really drawn to. Second is that we have really deep ties in the culinary community. Third is I drive cars, classic cars, and the car community there is off the hook. Fourth, I wanted to own a nature preserve. 

So we bought 227 acres worth saving. 

I started talking to a chef, Kyle Connaughton of Single Thread, one of the top 50 restaurants in the world. He told me that everything came from within 40 miles of his restaurant, except two things: a small amount of fish because we're not on the coast and wagyu flown at great expense once a week from Japan. 

I thought I could have the wagyu graze on our land to reduce fire hazard and roam free because I believe in animal happiness, but also to create a culinary product which would be at the level of the top restaurants in the world. That's what we did.

Bisnow: Give us a bold prediction for the rest of 2024.

Gordon: This is the first moment in many years when people who I would talk to feel proud to be an American, and I think there's an optimism, an energy and an acceptance that we're seeing in this electoral cycle with [Kamala] Harris and [Tim] Walz that we have not experienced in a very long time. 

I think that the best instincts of America will prevail, and they will be our new president and vice president. 

My bold prediction in real estate is not bold at all. It's obvious we're going to see a continuation of what we have seen for a number of years, which is that retail and office are in a worse condition than people will admit, and the developers who invest early in housing will be rewarded. 

I'm very optimistic about the city and its durability. Seeing what the [NYC] Economic Development Corp. and Mayor [Eric] Adams is accomplishing is really heartwarming because it wasn't that long ago that we were coming out of the [Bill] de Blasio era, which was so dispiriting.

Bisnow: What's your favorite weekend routine or favorite weekend activity?

Gordon: It's family first for me. In California, it's a walk or a run through the vineyards and then, typically, coffee and a drive in classic cars. Then off to a farmers market, making dinner and enjoying our mini donkeys and Silkie chickens with my wife.

In New York, we have one of our two sons here. We might see him and go to our favorite coffee spot, Fellini, for cappuccinos. Then maybe take a walk down to Chinatown or go see some art. Then Via Carota later in the day.