You are reading

Robert De Niro’s Wildflower Studios Gets DOB Approval to Start Construction in Astoria

Rendering of Wildflower Studios (Courtesy of Wildflower LTD/ Bjarke Ingels Group)

Feb. 10, 2022 By Allie Griffin

Robert de Niro’s $600 million movie studio will soon take shape on the Astoria waterfront.

Wildflower LTD — backed by the actor, his son Raphael De Niro and producer Jane Rosenthal — has received permits from the city’s buildings department to begin construction on a seven-story film production studio at 35-15 19th Ave.

The company can now break ground on its planned 775,000-square-foot complex that will be built between the Steinway & Sons Piano Factory and Luyster Creek, a short inlet branching off the East River at the top of Astoria. The developers purchased the five-acre lot from the Steinway Piano company for about $72 million in 2019.

The state-of-the-art building, named Wildflower Studios, will include 11 sound stages in addition to carpentry shops, dressing rooms, lounges and office spaces. It will also include a parking lot for 310 vehicles and a publicly accessible waterfront esplanade that will go along Luyster Creek (also known as Steinway Creek).

The Wildflower team has offered to work with the community to create a plan to improve the blighted area where 19th Avenue abuts Luyster Creek.

Rendering of the public waterfront area outside Wildflower Studios (Courtesy of Wildflower LTD/ Bjarke Ingels Group)

Wildflower LTD described its project — designed by world-renowned architecture firm Bjarke Ingels Group — as “a vertical village for film production” and a way to bring the movie-making industry to the east coast.

The project required zoning authorization given its scale, as well as permits from multiple agencies. The site at one pointed contained a number of manufacturing and warehouse buildings that were part of the Steinway Piano Factory.

The project received the support of both Queens Community Board 1 and the Queens Borough president as well as the approval of the City Planning Commission.

Wildflower Studios is expected to open in late 2023 and bring more than 1,000 permanent union jobs once it is up and running, according to the company.

It will join two other high-profile studios in Queens, namely Astoria Kaufman Studios and Silvercup in Long Island City.

The studios are being built at 35-15 19th Ave. by Luyster Creek (Gmaps)

email the author: news@queenspost.com
No comments yet

Leave a Comment
Reply to this Comment

All comments are subject to moderation before being posted.

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Recent News

Op-Ed | Four years after Hurricane Ida, Queens deserves real climate resilience

Sep. 2, 2025 By Assembly Member Jessica González-Rojas

Four years ago, Hurricane Ida tore through our neighborhoods of East Elmhurst, Corona and Jackson Heights, leaving behind devastation we will never forget. We lost neighbors to the floodwaters. Families saw their homes destroyed, their basements wiped out, their lives upended. Immigrant families—so many of them undocumented—were hit the hardest, often excluded from relief altogether. Ida was not just a storm; it was a wake-up call.

Fall fun in western Queens: Your guide to the best seasonal events

Aug. 29, 2025 By Jessica Militello

With beach days and summer BBQs behind us, the start of September rings in the start of magnificent Fall foliage, Halloween and more fun activities that come with the start of Autumn, including a list of Fall events in the area. From apple picking to seasonal ciders and more, there is tons to explore in the community. From Mystic Markets to scary movie meet-ups and more, here is a list of Fall events you do not want to miss.

Fresh Meadows MS-13 gang associate sentenced to nearly a half-century in prison for murder of Corona teen in Kissena Park: Feds

An MS-13 gang associate from Fresh Meadows was sentenced to 45 years in federal prison on Tuesday, Aug. 26, for the 2018 slaying of a Corona teenager in Flushing’s Kissena Park.

Juan Amaya-Ramirez, 27, and his co-defendant Oscar Flores-Mejia, 25, from Elmhurst, who is also an associate of the transnational criminal organization, pleaded guilty to the murder of 17-year-old Andy Peralta in Brooklyn federal court last September.

AG’s office launches investigation into death of man run over by police officer in Flushing Meadows Corona Park

The New York Attorney General’s Office of Special Investigations (OSI) has launched a probe into the death of a civilian on Saturday, Aug. 23, following a motor vehicle collision involving NYPD officers in Flushing Meadows Corona Park.

At approximately 4:37 p.m., an NYPD officer from the 110th Precinct in Elmhurst was driving westbound in a marked police cruiser, a 2015 Ford Taurus, at around 10 miles per hour in front of the Queens Theater on United Nations Avenue South, across from the Unisphere, when the vehicle ran over a man who was allegedly lying face up on the roadway prior to the collision, police said.