This site, settled in 1644 by emancipated slaves, was the first free African-American community on the island. Today, Soho (an acronym for SOuth of HOuston Street) is the trendy heart of Downtown, as well as one of America's finest conservatories of cast-iron architecture, with its tenement blocks adorned with elegant painted colonnades. A haunt of artists in the 1960s, the neighbourhood has since become far too pricey for their likes and now has a population to match its gentrified status.