Steve Needleman

The son of legendary fashion entrepreneur-turned-downtown real estate mogul Jack Needleman, Steve has carved out his own standing on the landscape of the Fashion District, Historic Core and beyond. 

His Anjac Fashion Buildings portfolio includes more than a half a million square feet of space across six buildings, including the historic Orpheum Theatre, a source of constant plugs for downtown Los Angeles via live shows and backdrop shots for countless films and commercials. 

Needleman’s holdings spread to the San Fernando Valley and other areas, but he has personally been a constant presence downtown since taking over from his late father in the 1990s, He’s been active in BIDs in the Historic Core and Fashion District. Lately, he’s made additions to the Orpheum, turning former ground-floor retail space to an interior make-up, wardrobe and staging area for Hollywood crews. 

He’s operated as a barometer of downtown trends over the years, converting the upper floors of the Orpheum to residential lofts in the early 2000s as adaptive-reuse took hold, catching a sweet spot between the Great Financial Crisis and the pandemic to sell the Western Pacific building south of Olympic Boulevard on Broadway to acquisitive Onni Group in 2016. More recently, he dipped his toe back into residential with the redevelopment of the Singer Building, on the 800 block of South Broadway, into luxury lofts.

—Jerry Sullivan