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But he won't be leaving Australia entirely behind.
Osborne is weeks away from opening M8, an Australian-themed bar pronounced mate, in Baltimore.
The spot will be replacing Checkerspot Brewing Co. on 175 Ostend St., and Osborne hopes to be fully operational on Sept. 10, when the Baltimore Ravens will play their first home game of the season.
Osborne first moved to the U.S. from a city near Brisbane, Australia in 1999, but moved back a few years later to raise his four kids with his wife. When the opportunity to open a bar in Baltimore arose for Osborne, he couldn't turn it down.
"I wasn't expecting it to happen so fast," he said.
Osborne initially was hoping to just set up a tap room with his co-founders.
"We weren’t going to go full brewery," he said. "I thought a bar would be fun and it would be cool to do a bar and serve beer from the eight states staring with the letter M."
Michigan. Minnesota. Montana — you get the idea. They'd call it, the 8M Taphouse.
But then, Osborne abandoned the concept and reversed the name.
"If you switch the 8M, you could make it the M8, or Mate Brewery," Osborne said. "It was all serendipitous how it came together like that."
M8 will brew all of its own beer, and has already begun at other local breweries. Come Sept. 1, when M8 moves into its new digs, it'll be fully-stocked with equipment to have as many as 15 different craft beers.
Osborne is hoping to bring some Aussie themes to M8, particularly with Pacific ales, XPAs, and other popular Australian pilsners and lagers. The TVs will mostly be playing American sports, but Australian football (soccer), rugby, and cricket will pop on at times.
"It's been a hectic six to nine months of pulling it together," said Osborne, "but we're really excited about opening, and can't wait to bring something unique to Baltimore that ties the best of both cities into the mix."
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