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Some called it West Soho, others North TriBeCa, and some just know it as the area around the Holland Tunnel, but the neighborhood in Lower Manhattan has its own identity. It’s called Hudson Square and a recent boom in leasing is finally putting this neighborhood on the map.

“Hudson Square is west of Sixth Avenue, goes approximately to Hudson River Park and the West Side Highway on the west, goes from Houston Street on the north and Canal Street on the south,” explains Ellen Baer, president of Hudson Square Connection.

Hudson Square has a different feel from the neighborhoods around it. It has unique industrial-style buildings, but with a nice small-town feel.

It was once known as the printing district, but it has evolved over the years and has now become a magnet for the creative industries, like advertising and public relations firms, media companies, and architects.

The PR firm Edelman moved its headquarters to Hudson Square from Times Square because the area breeds creativity, says the agency’s president.

“One of the reasons we were drawn down here is because it already had that confluence of the creative industries,” says Edelman New York President Russell Dubner. “So you have media companies, technology companies, and communication firms that were all clustering in one space. And we liked the idea that we were on the cusp of some change. As a firm, we like to be in a place that’s undergoing change, as opposed to a place that has completely arrived.”

There is over nine-million square feet of commercial space in the area. And because it was the old printing district, the buildings offer big industrial spaces, large floor plates, high ceilings and big windows – allowing each tenant to create their own space.

Edelman, for example, can easily fit 160 people on a floor in an open floor plan.

The district is made up mostly of commercial space, and about 40 percent of that property is owned by Trinity Church Realty. The group currently owns 17 buildings in the area and has played a major role in the neighborhoods transformation.

President Carl Weisbrod says there has been quite an uptick in demand. He says Hudson Square continues to emerge and will soon be one of the city’s hot neighborhoods.

“We are going to continue to see this neighborhood grow, not only as a creative district, but as a mixed-use district where there are more residents, more retail, a more beautiful street environment,” he says. “And I think we are going to see this neighborhood become one of the most exciting neighborhoods in the city.”

Until then, many tenants say they’ll still have to explain to people where exactly they work with when they say Hudson Square. But as development and leasing increase, this small district is getting ready to have a big impact on New York.