Red Brick Dust ~ Filipino Conjure & Rootwork

As a student of this path, I have come to see this mineral not just as a tool, but as a symbolic boundary—a "red line" that separates the sacred space of the home from the chaos of the outside world.

Ancient Roots and the Kongo Connection

One of the most profound things I’ve learned is that the use of red pigments for protection isn't a modern invention. Its origins can be traced back to the Kongo people, who used a red pigment called tukul—a clay rich in iron oxide. In Kongo tradition, tukul was applied to specific areas of power figures to imbuing them with spiritual potency. When the Enslaved were brought to the Americas, this ancestral memory survived, eventually evolving into the practice of "reddening" the doorstep in places like New Orleans and St. Louis.

We make our own version of Chinese Wash with broom straws and lemongrass leaves, a bottle of Pine-Sol with fresh pine needles, cinnamon bark and powder, white sugar, and red brick dust.

Witnessing Protection Works

Traditional practitioners often describe red brick dust as a "spiritual fence." It is frequently used at the front gate or doorstep to create a psychic barrier. In my research, I have observed several traditional methods for applying this "reddening":

The Business Threshold: I have found that it is common for practitioners to incorporate red brick dust into a business money floor wash. This is typically prepared with ingredients like cinnamon powder, brown sugar, and cleaners like Chinese Wash or Pine-Sol. The ritual involves scrubbing the doorstep or shop floor in an inward motion, a practice believed to ensure continuous cash inflow and financial prosperity. Some even create their own versions of these washes using broom straws, lemongrass, fresh pine needles, and white sugar.

The Shield of the Law: The "reddening" is also traditionally included in potent home protection rituals. I have learned of older, more intense methods in which the threshold might be washed with water infused with holy substances and protective oils—such as Fiery Wall of Protection, Law Keep Away, or Van Van—sometimes combined with symbolic cleansing acts, such as using urine to seal the boundary.

The Spiritual Barrier: In these traditions, the dust is often combined with other symbolic elements, such as ashes from a name-paper or graveyard dirt collected from the resting place of a "protector" figure (like a soldier or policeman), to create a barrier against negative influences.

Red brick dust is most often employed at the front gate or stoop in New Orleans and St. Louis, where red brick buildings are typical.

A Personal Connection: From Manila to the Deep South

As someone of Filipino heritage, I find a beautiful resonance in how materials are sourced. While Hoodoo tradition suggests that "the older the brick, the better," I have found a meaningful parallel in my own backyard, so to speak. I use red brick sourced from Fort Santiago in Intramuros, an ancient fortress in Manila built in 1590. Using a mineral curio from a site of such historical resilience allows me to honor the spirit of the practice while remaining grounded in my own geographic reality and heritage.

References & Further Reading:

Thompson, Robert Farris. (1983). Flash of the Spirit: African & Afro-American Art & Philosophy. Vintage Books.
MacGaffey, Wyatt. (1986). Religion and Society in Central Africa: The Bakongo of Lower Zaire. University of Chicago Press.
Anderson, Jeffrey E. (2005). Conjure in African American Society. Louisiana State University Press.
Hurston, Zora Neale. (1935). Mules and Men. J.B. Lippincott.
Long, Carolyn Morrow. (2001). Spiritual Merchants: Religion, Magic, and Commerce. University of Tennessee Press.

See, What Our Path Is

Being immensely interested in African diaspora religions and Folk Catholicism, we primarily honor our ancestors, Church saints, angels, folk saints, and Afro-Caribbean spirits such as loas and orishas. If we absolutely have to put a label on ourselves, we prefer the label of “Folk Judeo-Christian” as we live according to the customs and traditions of conjure workers and root doctors from the Deep South and syncretic followers of Christ in various nations of the Caribbean and Latin America.

Our spirituality includes West African-based Caribbean-style tradition as well as Esoteric Christianity and Yoruba religion. Generally, we practice Gullah folk magic popularly known in the Deep South as Hoodoo or Lowcountry Voodoo; the ancient wisdom founded by Orunmila in Ile-Ife called Ifa, and a bit of Lihim na Karunungan (Filipino Esotericism or Philippine Mystery Tradition).

Respect, What Hoodoo Is

Despite visible evidence of Central West African, Islamic/Moorish, Native American, Judeo-Christian, European, and even a few East Indian/Hindu, Chinese, and Latino/Caribbean retentions, influences, and admixtures, this does not mean that Hoodoo is an open and unrestricted system of eclectic magic.

Conjure, and Rootwork is rooted in African-American culture and Folk Protestant Christianity. Any practitioners of Hoodoo who did not grow up within African-American culture should still have a fuller understanding and high regard for its origin.

In the beginning, the early conjure doctors were entirely Black. The students were all Black, the elders were Black, the teaching was Black, and they focused only on Blacks as their audience. But other races were accepted when they had also been brought into the Hoodoo community and learned the tradition. Even so, we should still acknowledge that Hoodoo, Conjure, or Rootwork is not ours but only belongs to the Black community. We are just believers who are grafted into their rich yet humble tradition and, by word and deed, embrace genuine African-American folk spirituality and magic. This is all we can do for all the blessings we received from God and our Black ancestors.

Hoodoo's lack of religious structure and hierarchical authority do not mean that any person or group can appropriate or redefine it. If one cannot respect Hoodoo as it is and for what it is, then please, do not play with it.

Learn, How Conjure Is Worked On

Authentic Conjure is not all about blending and selling oils and casting spells online to make money. Hoodoo has its own spiritual philosophy, theology, and a wide range of African-American folkways, customs, and practices which include, but are not limited to, veneration of the ancestors, Holy Ghost shouting, snake reverence, spirit possession, graveyard conjure, nkisi practices, Black hermeneutics, African-American church traditions, the ring shout, the Kongo cosmogram, ritual water immersions, crossroads magic, making conjure canes, animal sacrifices, Jewish scriptural magic, enemy works, Seekin' ritual, magical incorporation of bodily fluids, etc.

Unfortunately, they are currently missing in marketeered or commercial Hoodoo, as they are being removed, disregarded, or ignored by unknowing merchants who simply want to profit from an African-American spiritual tradition, thus reducing Hoodoo to just a plethora of recipes, spells, and tricks.

Tim and I are completely aware that we are not African-Americans, so we are doing our best to retain and preserve the customs and traditions of the slave ancestors to avoid unnecessary conflict with the larger Black-Belt Hoodoo community and prevent them from labeling us inauthentic outsiders and our practice as mere 'cultural misappropriation.'

Accept, Who We Are

The byproduct of eons of slave history, Black supremacists believe that only people with African or African-American blood are real Hoodoo practitioners and are often inclined to consider themselves as the elite of the Hoodoo community; a place in which they believed that Whites, Latinos, Asians or any other races who do not have Black ancestry do not belong. Black supremacists are prone to be very hostile towards both “outsiders” and those accepting of them, fearing that their promotion and acceptance would dilute or even negate the Black identity of Hoodoo.

Although we do understand why some Blacks hold this stance, since a lot of people nowadays are misappropriating many aspects of Hoodoo and teaching the spiritual path even without proper education and training (for purely monetary purposes), we would, however, want to say that not all non-Black Hoodoo practitioners are the same.

WE respect what Hoodoo is, and we never try to change it, claim it as our own, disregard its history, take unfair advantage of it, speak against the people who preserve it, and mix it with other cultures (like our own) and call it Filipino/Pinoy Hoodoo, Gypsy Hoodoo or Wiccan Hoodoo because there are no such things.