His designs were stimulated by buildings in Munich and the chateaux of France's Loire Valley, he said, citing maverick Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi, designer of Barcelona's Sagrada Familia cathedral, as an inspiration.
One of his construction workers, former soldier Ma Wenneng, tinkered with a fountain on a balcony and dismissed the challenges of recreating foreign designs on Chinese soil.
"Actually, European castles are really easy to build," he said. "The boss has a book of castle pictures in his office and we use that as a reference."
China's building boom is unprecedented in human history, with the country's urban population growing by an average of over 20 million people a year for more than a decade -- resulting in hectares of utilitarian, cookie-cutter developments.
Urbanisation has raised living standards for millions, but Liu says he is taking a stand against miles of identical apartments.
"China needs castles, because it needs a more pluralistic culture," he said. "A city needs people who have dreams, to help society develop."
Liu is not the only person chafing at China's homogenous urban environment.The then vice minister of construction Qiu Baoxing complained in 2007 of "a thousand cities having the same appearance".
Tom Miller, an expert on China's urbanisation, said: "If you were parachuted in blind to almost any Chinese city, and you were looking around, you would have the same uniform buildings.
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