Designer Spotlight: Sensen Lii of Windowsen

Between moving his brand from Shanghai to Paris, creating customized looks for some biggest pop stars, and designing two forthcoming collections, Windowsen’s founder and creative director, Sensen Lii, somehow found time to create a couture, crystal embellished gown to showcase Preciosa's most exciting innovation, Cobalt Blue.

We caught up with Sensen over the summer to learn about what he’s been up to and what we can expect from Windowsen in the future.

Preciosa: Can you talk a little bit about the inspiration and design of the piece you created for our innovations campaign? Do you design around the new color, Cobalt Blue, or do you first create a design and add the crystals later?

SL: For me, it is a simultaneous process. I synthesize all the information at once, think about it together, and search for inspiration. When I saw Cobalt Blue for the first time, it immediately felt a sense of coldness and profound mystery, which was actually the opposite of my state of mind at the time. This really inspired me to create a sense of contrast. The starting point of the inspiration for this piece is actually a concept of ice and fire, like a burning ice queen slowly emerging from the darkness.

Created specially for Preciosa's AW 2024 crystal innovation campaign to showcase our new color Cobalt Blue, this couture two-piece Windowsen gown features a mixture of individually applied crystals and custom crystal transfers and took three people and two and a half weeks to complete.

crystals and rhinestones on Windowsen dress

This couture two-piece gown was created specially for Preciosa to showcase our new color Cobalt Blue.

Detail of the fabric with applied crystals.

The gown features a mixture of individually applied crystals and custom crystal transfers.

Preciosa: Can you talk about some of the projects you’ve worked on during the past year?

SL: We released only one collection last year – a two-part series entitled The Reincarnation of MX. Ridiculous, which featured highly exaggerated silhouettes embellished with lots of crystals. We also dedicated more time to exploring different collaborative projects. For example, at the end of 2022 we were invited to create several custom looks for The Love of Couture exhibition held at Hong Kong’s K11 Musea, which celebrated six emerging East Asian designers. Since the beginning of this year, we have also worked with many performance artists, creating and customizing costumes for music videos and concert tours. So far, we have worked with Zheng Xiuwen, Zhang Huimein and Angela Chang, just to name a few.

Preciosa: What is it like seeing your designs on some of the world’s biggest popstars, like the ladies of BLACKPINK or Kim Petras?

SL: I feel very honored, of course. I am so happy that my work is being recognized by some of the most outstanding talent in the industry, and I hope opportunities for collaboration will continue.

Preciosa: Is it a fun process, creating custom looks for specific celebrities?

SL: Absolutely. Every artist is unique, so every project is a completely new and different experience. It is important to incorporate aspects of their look and personality into the overall concept, which can be an exciting challenge for me. The creative process for these special occasions is very interesting to me and provides me with a lot of inspiration for the future.

Preciosa: Do you have a recent favorite?

SL: Earlier this year we did a custom look for Taiwanese singer A-Mei, which was incredible to see lit up on stage. We hand-applied nearly 250,000 Preciosa crystals in different sizes of Citrine yellow to a black velvet dress to create a bursting gradient effect and it turned out so well. This piece has to be one of my favorites.

Crystal

creative

Windowsen’s founder and creative director, Sensen Lii.

Custom look for Taiwanese singer A-Mei, with nearly hand-applied 250,000 Preciosa crystals in different sizes of Citrine yellow.

Preciosa: Do you already know where/when your next collection will be? Can you give us any hints about what we can expect?

SL: We will present our next collection in October at Paris Fashion Week for the first time, which is incredibly exciting. The presentation will be completely unconventional so, naturally, I am really looking forward to it.

Preciosa: We understand you are planning to show at Couture Week in January. Which do you enjoy designing for more, couture or ready to wear?

SL: It really depends on my mood at any given moment. Recently, I am really enjoying making ready to wear. I have so many ideas I want to try.

Preciosa: And last, but not least, what are Windowsen’s immediate plans for the future?

SL: I hope to further expand the scope of the brand’s activities, gradually move the brand to Paris, and become more active internationally. I also hope to have more opportunities to try new fields and make more interesting and inspiring designs. Just to keep living out and working with my fantasy.