Historic SoHo in New York City

Historic SoHo in New York City

Historic SoHo in New York City

So named for its location (South of Houston , the New York City neighborhood referred to as SoHo has a rich and eventful history that belies its current status as the premier high fashion and arts district of downtown Manhattan.

Beginning as farmland, downtown Manhattan quickly grew after the English bought the island from the Dutch in the 1600s, leading to the construction of many taverns, brothels and hotels thorughout the early part of the 19th century. From its early cultural prominence in the mid-1800s, the area of SoHo became primarily home to manufacturing plants and sweatshops of cast iron construction towards the turn of the 20th century. The growth of uptown sapped the neighborhood of vitality, leaving behind abandoned structures little to no indigenous culture and raw industrial space most would consider uninhabitable. In the mid-1960s, an ill-fated campaign by then-mayor John Lindsay to turn the neighborhood into a thoroughfare (the Lower Manhattan Expressway, or LoMex) failed due to local activism in the name of cultural and historical preservation of the buildings in the area, which were constructed with cast-iron support columns and facades and representing the largest collection of such structures in the world. This led to the middle era in SoHo's exciting history, in which artists took the neighborhood (and its improvement) into their own hands.

After the prospective highway plan was thrown out, many of the remaining historically important buildings remained nearly (some completely) unoccupied. Unlike the brownstones common in other areas of New York, SoHo had previously been a manufacturing district and thus fulfilled the requirements for many artists, who began to move into the neighborhood throughout the 1960's and 70's. High ceilings, large windows with abundant natural light, and extremely cheap rent all contributed to the influx of artists, who began to organize over this period to petition the city to rezone SoHo as a quasi-residential area. Many of the inhabitants converted their spaces from previously unlivable raw manufacturing space into live-work loft spaces without any protection under the law. In 1971 the area was rezoned, following active lobbying by residents requesting legal recognition of their improvements to the buildings, leading to increased occupancy and an explosion of the local art scene. Over time, the neighborhood became renowned for its forward-thinking artistic contributions, ranging from pop-up galleries to special events.

However, SoHo's transformation was not yet complete. The noticeable improvement of the neighborhood through artists and their cultural expansion eventually led to improved economic conditions and gentrification, leading to the coining of the term "the SoHo effect" that has been used to describe this process in other neighborhoods and cities across the US. As NYC generally and specifically downtown improved, the rising property taxes meant that the cheap rents that had initally attracted the avant-garde to SoHo eventually displaced many of them, leading to their seeking out cheaper areas (which would often suffer similar fates). Now SoHo is one of the most popular districts in Manhattan for shopping, apparel, walking tours and other tourist attractions in addition to events and exhibitions that are still held in the neighborhood. While many artists remain in the upper stories, high-end boutiques and fashionable clothing stores have come to replace many of the art galleries, most of which have moved northwest into Chelsea. Now some of the most expensive downtown real estate, SoHo still has a few exceptional large exhibition spaces, which often host events ranging from runway shows by the most prestigious fashion labels to large corporate events, food and wine tastings, photography shoots, and trade shows that draw enthusiasts from all over the city and worldwide.

With its exceptional location and beautifully preserved architecture, there are few areas in New York that represent the city's endless capacity for renewal and remembrance of its humble beginnings so well.

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