The Long Way Around
Jaipur to Los Angeles, by way of everywhere else
DUSHYANT makes menswear for the man who's moved past trends. A Los Angeles-based label built on the hand-printed and handloom fabrics of India—contemporary silhouettes with lived-in warmth.
THE STORY
New Year's Day. A cold London morning. I woke up in a hotel room and asked myself a question I'd been avoiding for years: What am I actually doing with my life?
I'd done everything right. Grown up in Jaipur, worked hard, moved to America, built a career in corporate America. Safe. Stable. And completely disconnected from the person I'd wanted to become.
As a kid in Jaipur, I was surrounded by color, texture, craft—block printers working in dusty courtyards, fabric drying on rooftops, the bright paper kites we'd fly from terraces. I didn't know then that I was absorbing a vocabulary I'd use later. I just knew I wanted to make things.
But middle-class kids from working families don't become fashion designers. They get degrees. They get jobs. So, I did.
That London morning started a conversation with myself that took four more years to resolve. In 2018, I launched DUSHYANT as a side project—a way to make the clothes I wanted to wear, using the techniques I'd grown up with. In 2021, I left the Fortune 500 behind and went all in.
Today, DUSHYANT lives between two places: India, where the fabrics are printed and woven by hand, and Los Angeles, where the brand is based and where its sensibility comes from. The work is slow. The colors are warm and sun-faded. Every piece is meant to get better with age—and to make you a little happier when you put it on.
Turns out, this is what I was supposed to be doing with my life. If wearing these clothes makes your day even slightly better, then the long way around was worth it.
"I design clothes that I would want to wear."
THE FOUNDER
Dushyant Asthana
I didn't go to fashion school. Instead, I spent over a decade in corporate America learning a truth that matters more than I expected: process beats potential. By the time I launched DUSHYANT, I had just enough naiveté to believe I could build a brand, and enough grit to make it real.
Now, the work follows me across continents.
In Los Angeles, it's about structure—designing, planning, and running the business. But twice a year, I head back to India. There, the rhythm changes. I trade my desk for print workshops, chasing down the perfect fabrics and spending evenings with my parents. I am always designing, whether I am at a computer or not.
It's a deeply personal process. When I look at a finished piece, I have a single filter: Would I wear it? If the answer isn't an immediate "yes," it doesn't make it to the collection.
My inspiration usually comes from the quiet moments. Long afternoons in cafés with a book, solo trips to museums when I need to refill, or just being at home surrounded by art and music. I don't try to force a connection between a painting I love and a garment I'm making, but it's always there. The colors, the textures, the feeling—it all comes from that lived experience.
The work is just a reflection of the life I live—and at this point, the two have blurred into one. I wouldn't have it any other way.
"Process beats potential."
The Crafts
Every shirt begins with a fabric crafted by hand
Block-printed, handloom, or naturally dyed using techniques practiced in India for centuries. The work is slow. The variations are intentional. The result is cloth that feels like it came from somewhere.