Caroline Haven in Causeway Bay is a blend of new and old Hong Kong

It's a familiar story: cheap rents draw independent businesses to a working-class enclave, transforming its car body shops and recycling depots into eccentric shops and eateries. Located between Haven Street and Caroline Hill Road at the back of Causeway Bay, the neighbourhood dubbed Caroline Haven seems to be following the same path as its cousins around Tai Ping Shan Street and Star Street.

But there's a difference. Rather than tong lau, this discreet corner is dominated by hulking apartment blocks from the 1960s. Much of the action here takes place in grimy shopping arcades that thread through the ground floor of these enormous buildings. It's a blessing and a curse, lending the area a distinctive atmosphere but leaving it vulnerable to property developers, which are slowly acquiring flats inside the buildings that make up the neighbourhood.

"I hope the property companies don't get majority ownership, because if they don't tear down these buildings, this will become a really hip area," says Kosei Kamatani.

Five years ago, the 30-year-old entrepreneur opened a frozen yogurt shop at the corner of Haven Street and Leighton Road, drawn by the unusual mix of affordable rent and heavy pedestrian traffic.

"It has a hidden-away feeling," he says. "It's one of the last bastions of old Hong Kong in Causeway Bay."

Kamatani now owns four businesses around Caroline Haven, including a pizzeria, a ramen shop, a shisha bar and an exceedingly popular Japanese ice cream parlour. In recent years they have been joined by a wave of new cafes, restaurants and boutiques. "People didn't notice this area before," says Kamatani. "But now they see the potential."