When Liu Yujia was a boy, lying on the grass during a picnic with his parents, a towering building with a spire caught his eye. That moment stayed with him.

"The blue felt full of vitality," he says.

Liu grew up in an industrial area about 10 kilometers from downtown Jilin, Jilin province. His happiest childhood memories are the rare occasions when his father would take him by bicycle into the city center to see its glittering skyline.

"Only when I got good grades would I get that reward. I still remember the dark brown windows, symbols of the luxury people dreamed of. Those buildings held everything I hoped for."

Now 24, Liu channels that early fascination into a unique passion. He has visited about 210 cities across 29 provinces photographing buildings from the 1980s to 2010s, becoming an influential blogger on Xiaohongshu, or RedNote, a popular Chinese lifestyle-sharing platform. Using the handle Tiehe West Street East, he has gained 160,000 followers.