Yanjiao initially attracted attention from the artistic community in 2006, when the Central Academy of Fine Arts established a satellite campus not far from the South Side of Hawaii. Art supply, printing and framing shops quickly popped up to serve the students, teachers and artists who would be living and working nearby.

The first artists found it lonely. “When I first got here, my building was completely empty, and there were no lights at night,” said Pange Yang, 26, who arrived in 2012. “I was the only person in the building.”

But as word of mouth about Yanjiao spread, more artists began coming.

“I was preparing to really do the poor, starving artist thing in Songzhuang,” a well-established artist village about a half-hour away, said Li Tianqi, 24, another founder of On Space. “But why rent a tiny shack in Songzhuang when you can have a nice studio in Yanjiao?”

No one knows how many young artists now call Yanjiao home, though the On Space founders estimate that at least several hundred have space here. Last year, the gallerists tried an informal census of the city’s artists, but ran out of time after conducting interviews with about 60 people.

Yanjiao has also caught the eye of established artists. Its most famous tenants are the Gao brothers, a pair of multimedia artists internationally known for their irreverent sculptures. In 2013, they bought a former factory building and turned it into an airy studio complex they call Blessgo, which they use for making larger works.