Welcome to Hause of Xroads
Hause of Xroads was founded by Skyla Barilaro, a Southern transplant now
living in the Philadelphia tri-state area. Growing up, Skyla spent years listening
to the stories, folklore, memories, and quiet wisdom carried by elders.
These stories were more than entertainment. They were fragments of culture,
pieces of history, and living reminders of traditions that once connected entire
communities.
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Over time, it became clear how easily those memories can fade.
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Across the African diaspora, especially in the American South, cultural
knowledge has long lived in oral tradition. Stories passed between generations,
spiritual practices shared in quiet moments, and folklore carried through family memory have preserved pieces of identity that were never written in textbooks. Yet the further communities moved from those roots, the more scattered those traditions became. Migration, modernization, and the rapid pace of changing times often left the voices of older generations unheard.
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From slavery through Reconstruction, through Jim Crow, through the Civil Rights era and beyond, each chapter of history reshaped communities and, in many ways, erased small pieces of cultural memory. Stories stopped being told. Traditions were forgotten. The voices of elders were often overlooked in a world moving too quickly to listen.
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Hause of Xroads was born from the belief that those stories still matter.
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The project began as a dream. A place where folklore, diaspora history, spiritual voices, artwork, oral storytelling, and forgotten cultural knowledge could be gathered, preserved, and shared. A place where the scattered pieces of memory could meet again at the crossroads.
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Hause of Xroads is both an archive and a revival. It is a living space dedicated to preserving Black folklore, diasporic history, spiritual traditions, and community memory. Through community events, storytelling, research, poetry, visual art, and cultural documentation, the house seeks to rebuild the connections that once held communities together.
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At its heart, Hause of Xroads exists for one purpose. To remember.
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To remember the stories.
To remember the traditions.
To remember that across distance, time, and history, we are still connected to one another.
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The crossroads is where paths meet again. And here, the work of remembering begins.
