WHAT IS TONE DEAF?
My name is Mustafa Ahmed. I’m the founder and creative director of TONE DEAF, and I’m 24 years old as I write this. (September 2025)
I’ve been building this body of work for over three years, but officially launched the brand last fall. TONE DEAF was created to make sense of the contradictions I’ve carried my whole life. I spent the first 12 year of my life in Pakistan and the following 12 in New York. For a long time, the tension between belonging and distance felt like a rupture. But now I see it as a gift. Those contradictions are the reason TONE DEAF exists. This work is my way of refining chaos into something clear, of taking everything that felt disjointed and giving it shape. That’s what refinement really is to me: not decoration, but devotion. And through that devotion, chaos finds meaning.
At first, I processed those feelings through music. I had no formal training, but I spent years producing, just following my ear. What I learned was that notes which theoretically fail to work together, that are out of tune or in the wrong key, can actually achieve harmony if you consider the note that comes before and after. If they’re properly contextualized, there’s no such thing as a wrong note.
That idea stuck with me. It gave me a way to think about contradiction, not as something to fix, but something to frame. TONE DEAF is built on that principle. It’s a technique for crafting artistic order from chaotic inputs. A way of creating from pure intuition, with no obligation to commercial trends, traditional formats, or consensus aesthetic rules. Just a focus on making things that resonate. Slowly produced, masterfully crafted, and rooted in personal storytelling.
The silhouettes I design are shaped by the West. The colors, textures, and rhythm come from the world I grew up in. But I’m not trying to blend them. I’m not aiming for fusion. I’m setting them against each other and waiting to see if they can find harmony through friction.
Because that’s what TONE DEAF really is: not a resolution of differences, but a practice of listening to them differently.
Craft Manufacturing
TONE DEAF is built on a return to dedicated mastery. In a time where speed and scale define everything, I wanted to make work that couldn’t be rushed. Fall/Winter 2025 puts a spotlight on artisans who have spent their entire lives refining a single practice, whether it's Ajrakh block printing or hand beading. These aren’t just techniques. They’re living traditions. Systems of knowledge passed down through families, rooted in rhythm, repetition, and spiritual discipline.
When I first began working with these artisans, I didn’t come in with answers, I came to learn. Their approach to craft is about more than precision. It’s about devotion. The idea that perfection isn’t something to achieve, but something to strive toward, over and over again, almost like a spiritual pratice. That’s what inspires me. And it’s why every piece in TONE DEAF starts from the hands of someone who treats their work as a kind of prayer.
BLOCK PRINTING (AJRAKH)
Every inch of our block printed pieces are made using Ajrakh, a 5,000-year-old block printing tradition. Over the past 2 years, I’ve traveled across the country, working directly with master artisans who have dedicated their lives to this sacred craft. Each 6-inch block is hand-carved from wood, and carries not just a motif, but the story of a people, a spiritual pursuit, and a striving toward geometric perfection. These garments take over 30 days to make. They’re dyed using natural pigments made from local fruits, vegetables, and trees, then hand-printed one block at a time, washed in the river, and sun-dried.
The spiritual and material history of the subcontinent bleeds into each six-inch block. Ajrak is nearly as old as civilized humanity itself. The technique’s origins trace back to 3000BC in the Sindh province of modern day Pakistan, when the Indus River birthed one of the world’s earliest cities, Mohenjo-daro.
The Indus River was integral to the craft’s development, providing both a site for washing cloth and the water needed to grow Indigo. In its earliest documented use, Ajrak is donned by the Priest-King depicted by the most famous stone sculpture of the Indus Valley Civilization.
Across epochs the art and its influence flourished until it dwindled during the industrial revolution, a development which denigrated the importance of time-intensive craftsmanship in international trade. Partition between India and Pakistan splintered the clusters of Ajrak masters further, and its cultural structure dissolved.
Still, across east Pakistan and west India, the heirs to the masters of the millenia-old vocation continue to edge towards mastery in their respective pockets. Their work is a breathing relic of an era where man strived for divinely inspired perfection. They live as if to say “we know it’s unachievable, but we strive to achieve it anyway.” A healthy contradiction to embody.
HAND BEADING
Each beaded piece is made entirely by hand, one stitch at a time, one bead at a time. It’s a slow and meditative craft that drew me in from the beginning. The process takes 48 hours of focused work to complete a single piece. No shortcuts. That pursuit is the backbone of TONE DEAF. These artisans are my teachers. I don’t come in with answers, I come to learn.
This form of hand embroidery beading has no singular name. Its history is therefore less contained than Ajrak’s. A direct translation is useful. In Urdu, “moti kashidakari” literally means bead embroidery.
Pakistani moti kashidakari originated during the Mughal period to embellish kurtas, rugs, and stoles. Inspired by natural forms like cauliflower, mangoes, and blossoms, the work of the beader is the work of a human interpreting the work of the divine in producing nature.
DENIM
At TONE DEAF, denim is a craft. Every pair begins with raw fiber selected for quality, durability, and feel. It is woven, dyed, cut, stitched, and finished entirely under one roof making our denim truly unique in the space. This vertical process gives us complete control over every detail, from tension in the weave to the shape of the silhouette. It’s as artisanal as our hand block printing or beading and just because it’s manifested through machines doesn’t make it any less human, or any less complex.
