Thursday evening, Xavier Duckett and the Humble Hustle team will throw open the doors and welcome friends, family, and neighbors to their polished co-working space, called The Collective. Duckett’s mission is to support entrepreneurs across the city while showcasing the collective beauty of Northwest Roanoke.
Duckett, who grew up in Roanoke, began working out of the space at 601 11th Street NW in 2018. Back then, he ran the Hmble Hstle Clothing shop out of a back room. A church and an inner city athletics organization occupied the front rooms. The shop remains, but the other tenants have moved on. In their place. Duckett has curated a beautiful space that is meant to support, uplift, and inspire the entrepreneurs and program planners who utilize the building.
Duckett is the founder and executive director of Humble Hustle, a youth empowerment initiative that encourages youth to pursue leadership, entrepreneurship, and personal growth. While Humble Hustle focuses on young people, The Collective is catered to the things that adult entrepreneurs most need.
The biggest changes in the building happened during the pandemic, Duckett says. During that time, he was inspired to reinvent the space. That’s why, though The Collective has existed in some form for five years, Duckett and his team are holding Thursday’s Grand Opening; the event will celebrate how far they’ve come and invite others to use the space.
The Thursday evening event will feature food, music, vendors, and the reveal of a new mural on the backside of the building – the building already features several works of art on its exterior walls.
“When you turn this block right here, this art makes people slow down a little bit,” Duckett says. The art makes people take note of where they are and begin to pay more attention to the space around them, he says.
“Every mural that’s been placed, every color, every texture, every piece of art is intentional,” Duckett says. He has hired local artists to create the murals in hopes that the artists’ stories will live on through the work they have produced, he says.
Duckett will also offer tours of his space on Thursday. He wants people to see the possibilities that The Collective provides. The Collective is a co-working space, a rental space, a place for meetings and a place for parties.
Small businesses can use the pop-up shop space as their own brick and mortar store. T-shirt designers can use the new creative space to press small batches of merchandise. Personal trainers can train clients in the gym space. Podcasters can take advantage of the media room to create content.
“No matter what someone is thinking of doing, we can accommodate it,” says director of operations Myleah Akers.
The Collective offers memberships along with one-time room rentals, according to Akers.
Furthermore, The Collective has partnered with a number of local businesses and organizations to provide beneficial services to the community, Akers says. Many of these events take place in the form of workshops focused on e-commerce or mental health, for instance. The team also offers a neighborhood run club through Let’s Conquer Fitness.
“We just want to inspire people. I want to inspire all of Northwest [Roanoke] or any overlooked community. There’s always going to be hope. As long as there’s hope, it can work,” Duckett says.
Duckett’s space, and his vision, are building a better neighborhood. Just down the block from The Collective, there is a convenience store, a clothing store, and a deli. The Hope Center is located nearby.
There are a lot of vacant buildings in the area. Duckett and his team are constantly working with people to improve their properties. He encourages building owners to paint, to add a mural, or to mow the grass.
Duckett hopes that even larger projects are on the horizon, both for The Collective and for Northwest Roanoke.
“People are used to [the neighborhood] looking like this. So they don’t expect anything, right? But in other neighborhoods, there’s constant change. There’s constant development. There’s constant revitalization,” Duckett says, referencing other neighborhoods in Roanoke City.
His hope is that developers will take note of the progress that is already being made in Northwest Roanoke. He wants locals to reevaluate any preconceived notions they might have of his neighborhood. He wants the community and the city to stand behind what he’s doing with The Collective, come alongside him, and help lift others up.
Most of all, Duckett wants people to recognize that The Collective is a space for everyone to come together, to dream, to work on projects, and to build businesses from the ground up. He wants people to be inspired.
“If [the building] looks like this on the outside, then people know we’ve got something going on on the inside,” Duckett says.
The Collective’s Grand Opening will take place from 5 to 8 p.m. at 601 11th St. NW on Thursday, August 24.
