diff --git a/depends/packages/xproto.mk b/depends/packages/xproto.mk
index 7a43c52faf4..7f3dfd3a999 100644
--- a/depends/packages/xproto.mk
+++ b/depends/packages/xproto.mk
@@ -21,6 +21,8 @@ define $(package)_build_cmds
   $(MAKE)
 endef
 
+# mkdir detection is broken on Alpine. Set MKDIRPROG to ensure we always
+# use "mkdir -p", and avoid parallelism issues during install.
 define $(package)_stage_cmds
-  $(MAKE) DESTDIR=$($(package)_staging_dir) install
+  $(MAKE) MKDIRPROG="mkdir -p" DESTDIR=$($(package)_staging_dir) install
 endef