The Mystic Krewe of Nyx parade grew quickly after its first parade in 2012, but its collapse was even quicker. The women’s krewe continues to parade on the Wednesday before Mardi Gras, though its 2022 parade was significantly smaller. Many Nyx members exited the krewe in summer 2020 over a controversial social media posts by […]
Sr. Mary Lou Specha loves Mardi Gras.
Not the Mardi Gras celebrated in much of the United States with a half-hearted king cake and some beads, but the celebration that begins on the feast of Epiphany and continues until the last moments before Ash Wednesday begins. She loves the
real Mardi Gras in New Orleans, where she lives and ministers.
Specha, a Sister of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary from Dubuque, Iowa, has lived in New Orleans for more than a decade. She is the executive director of Hotel Hope, which provides short-term emergency housing for families experiencing homelessness. Specha s roommate, Presentation Sr. Julie Marsh, is director of operations at Hotel Hope.
photo: Ryan Hodgson-Rigsbee
From a bead-bedecked gallery on St. Charles Ave., masked revelers designed by Sean Gautreaux peer down the parade route for the bands that will play again next Mardi Gras.
When the mayor of New Orleans cancelled Mardi Gras 2021 late last November, crews sheathed their half-built floats in plastic to await better times, and Caroline Thomas, a Mardi Gras artist, called her old friend Devin De Wulf with an idea.
Since March, De Wulf, founder of the Krewe of Red Beans, has spearheaded efforts to support New Orleanians effected by the pandemic through Feed the Front Line and Feed the Second Line, hiring out-of-work musicians and restaurant workers to prepare and deliver food to E.R. staff and Mardi Gras Indians, members of Social Aid & Pleasure clubs and other community elders. Now, there was a new opportunity to help those who create and sustain New Orleans’s culture.