His formal project began in May 2023, during his third year studying architecture at China University of Mining and Technology (Beijing). With a new camera, he began traveling alone to search for millennium-era buildings, usually in city centers and commercial hubs.

To save money, he stays in the cheapest youth hostels and eats street food, spending about 60 yuan ($8.4) a day. Sometimes fans join him, and together they find buildings from their shared memories.

"Every time my photos resonate with netizens, it heals me," he says. Among his photos, his favorite is a white-brick building in Zhuozhou, Hebei province, with blue windows and exterior spiral staircases, like something from an animation or a dream.

The city that impressed him the most was Benxi in Liaoning province, a coal-producing area whose 1980s boom gave rise to high-rises scattered across a sloped landscape.

Sanmenxia in Henan province, Baoji in Shaanxi province, and Huangshi in Hubei province also left deep marks. These cities, he says, have largely avoided large-scale development. Their aging buildings, unchanged for more than a decade, feel like time is standing still.

A lover of art, Liu dreams of "a nomadic lifestyle — free from workplace pressure, where I can do what I love purely out of passion". He hopes to visit more cities and eventually stage solo exhibitions of his work.