Meet Oslo DiRosaria of Bywater, New Orleans

Today we’d like to introduce you to Oslo DiRosaria.

Hi Oslo , can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
My names is Olso DiRosaria – though I didn’t always go by that name. My mother named me Rachaela DiRosaria and by that name I was a full time artist, designer and builder, traveling all over the united states for work and to show my art. I am also a non-binary trans-identifying individual, and though I am female-presenting it is not how I see myself or how I want to be seen.

I love traveling, being on the road and finding community pockets in the cities I went to – but I also deeply know the other side of traveling to unfamiliar areas and not fully knowing if you are safe, knowing that masking is the only option for acceptance. Many times chose to camp, sleep in my van and later on, fully building out a bus to travel in with my family. I always felt safer in my vehicle than in some motels, inns or airbnbs. You never know how the face behind the counter will react to you when you live outside the binary.

As a designer and builder, I became more passionate about creating experiences in which people could feel safe in, feel seen and feel safe. My sister and I purchased a pair of cabins in Tombstone, Arizona which I fully restored and rent out as vacation properties when we are not there ourselves with our families. I feel privileged to directly interact with folks from all over the country and world and helping them know they are safe and accepted when they stayed with us – regardless of language differences, skin color, presentation or orientation. I’ve now been hosting for over 11 years and love it.

In 2023, shortly after meeting my now husband, Cyrus Giroir I decided to take my passion for design, experience, travel and safe spaces a step further and together we purchased a dilapidated 1955 motel-looking property in the Bywater Neighborhood of New Orleans, LA with the vision of creating an intersectional lodging experience with a focus on Trans and Queer identifying people – a place people can come and truly let down their guard and be fully and loudly themselves; be able to look around the space and see people like them.

At first we had a very humble vision, as we did not anticipate the need or interest being very high, we started out living on the top floor and renting out 3 units on the bottom floor that walked out to the expansive clothing-optional pool and courtyard area. In addition to the rooms we rented, we had a concept for a private, curated pool-membership for locals we felt needed a safe space to go, people like me who never really want to visit public or densely populated pools. Again, we very much underestimated the need for such a space – we designed an application and vetting process to try and encourage a space of people who took seriously the mission and vision that we were aspiring for.

I have done a lot of hard things in my life, a lot of big projects, built a lot of hard things – so when I say we were in over our heads I mean that in every way. What started off as a more moderate version of what we are today – they are vastly different. between the costs of building everything and the sheer scope of what we did, we went all in. We invested our entire life’s savings, stopped taking any other jobs and focused all our time and resources into bringing The Railyard from aspiration to reality. During this time, my husband’s company went upside-down and we lost our only income. after that we hit permitting issues due to the Airbnb wars in our area (which affected all lodging, not just Airbnb’s but hotels, motels and bed and breakfasts like ours). Issue after issue popped up but we pushed through it all and after a 9 month delay that broke us in every way, in October 2024 we finally emerged with our license and The Railyard was officially born.

Opening a pool-centered facility in the late fall that had no capital, no marking team, and no way to say “hey, we are here” but the community, who had become aware of what we were trying to build rallied behind us – gave us the energy we needed to see it through and by the early spring of 2025 we had a lot of traction. We opened up our memberships and within a few weeks were at capacity, moving applications to a waitlist that we were still processing into the fall and winter. The response we got was overwhelming and was not at all what we expected but something that really made me see that my experience were shared by many and the need was more than we had known. We ended up moving out of the building and creating 3 more units giving us a total of 6 suites now and memberships are going strong.

Both Cyrus and I are very passionate about the community we serve and in our first year alone we were able to give back over $42,000 through space donation, cash donation or sponsorships, which is so amazing for a business in it’s first year! We operate under the notion that our success should be a success for our neighborhood and community and take every opportunity that we can to give back and to showcase the kinds of business practices that we want to see more of.

We look back of everything we have put in and everything that has happened over the short 18mo we have been open and are truly gobsmacked. We have had our share of push-back and questioning – being a clothing optional trans and queer centered space, you can expect that but within our walls we like to create a reality where that hate and intolerance isn’t expected – a world where that is in the past.

I could go on and on but I think thats a fair start for our story

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I mentioned some issues that we faced in the past question but the first obstacles that we faced was the permitting freeze that lasted 9 months right in the middle of our project. We very heavily considered selling the whole thing and giving up as we didnt have the funds to keep it going with nothing coming in and no real end in sight.

The second issue we faced was that even us living there and just enjoying our space, having community gatherings and a couple pool parties – we attracted a lot of negative attention from neighbors who were not enthusiastic about having a big gay pool and microtel in their area – despite that we are in an area full of bars, music venues and most notably, a train that goes by 2-8 times a day (and night). the very train where we got our name from as it passes only 10 feet from our property line.

The third issue we faced was from within the community we sought to serve – calling into question our commitment to safety, the validity of my identity and the intent that we had when building such a place. That was the hardest blow, having the people you are most committed to, who you identify most with, tell you that you do not belong that I had no business running a place like The Railyard. This wasn’t the worst case scenario as it allowed the chance for Cyrus and I to step back and really look at the big picture and ask ourselves ‘are we doing this the right way, are we doing enough’ – and through that we were able to strengthen our weak spots, to ask others for help and input and ultimately create a better, safer and more transparent space for people to feel good about supporting and coming to.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Both Cyrus and I come from very different backgrounds – both professionally and lifestyle.

I was born in rural Indiana on a defunct farm and homeschooled until I was 14 when we moved to the city where I attended school for the first time and for the first time had access to art supplies! I flourished as I had always been an artist creating houses, people and scenes with just yellow legal pads and scotch tape I took from my dad’s office when my sister and I would go with him at night. I have never found a medium I didn’t love and though I gained three scholarships before graduation, I didn’t follow that path after highschool – something I regretted but my sister and I felt very responsible to take care of our mother, pretty much our whole lives. I ended up moving to New Orleans in my early 20s to follow my heart and passion for art – creating art for open air markets and various galleries around New Orleans I then began to show nationally gaining attention for my mixed media folk-art style dioramas and sculptures. Being naturally creative and highly motivated I continued creating moving into larger platforms and eventually designing and building on a smaller scale to doing entire boats and houses and eventually large-scale commercial projects such as the Railyard and other hotels.

Cyrus comes from the small Bayou town of Morgan City, Louisiana – growing up in a single parent house hold and moving frequently due to poverty Cyrus had a desire for stability and consistency and quickly applied his skill for organization and service, opening his first retail store in New Orleans in 2001. After Katrina in 2005, he reopened but with lagging tourism and high theft he closed his doors, relocating the business with his partner to New York where he split his time between Louisiana and new york for over a decade. Successful with both in-person retail and online he spent many more years designing sales systems that would end up becoming the standard for platforms such as Amazon. In 2018 he returned full time to Louisiana to spend more time with his then 11 year old son and worked remotely. He still owns the same business he has had for 24 years though it is not the volume it once was and all his attention has since turned to The Railyard

What makes you happy?
For me, the thing that makes me happy is quite honestly servitude and creation. I really need both. I am a high-energy person and I very literally need to create to feel happy. Visual art, interior design, new systems of service, website or marketing, whatever – just as long as I am creating. In regards to servitude, I absolutely love to care for others, to let them know they are safe, seen and valued. That they are deserving of good things and good experiences. With all the pain that the world is going through right now it feels like the individual cannot make a significant difference but even if all you do is make one person’s day better you may give them the strength that they need to get by and maybe do good for someone else. That matters to me more than anything.

For Cyrus, a lot of his joys from other people’s joy and in this moment he feels like creating joy for people who are struggling to find it is a valuable part of his life. Being a Gen X’er and living through the AIDS epidemic, seeing people die and the hate and mis-information that was spread about the gay and queer community left a huge impact on him. Spending his adult life in a corporate world that was capitalist-driven that truly in the end did serve much but capital growth and lost him years of seeing his son grow up – he now finds joy in reallocating his skills learned from his corporate life into creating and keeping stable a business that simply exists for the joy and safety of others while also giving back – especially during this new wave of transphobia, he can not think of a better thing he would want to be doing in his life than providing a safe haven for that community.

Pricing:

• Rooms start at $125 a night
• Memberships are $60-110 a month
• We have many fundraisers for various groups
• We have merchandise that funds our low or no cost membership program for at-risk community members

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.therailyardnola.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/therailyardnola/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/p/The-Railyard-Nola-61566968674313/