When I lived in the area, I was told that "SoHo" was an abbreviation for "South of Houston" street and "NoHo" meant "North of Houston" street.
It’s a typical cutesy real estate word that was always meant to conjure up images of London. And yes, that’s the cutesy way of saying “south of Houston” but it was only introduced several decades ago when people started gentrifying there. As a kid, we never heard of a neighborhood called Soho. Actually, I must find out when Chelsea came into vogue. Always harking to London neighborhoods for some reason. Why can’t we have La Halle or Montparnesse?