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mxtsg was born on a quiet winter night in 2018, inside a 12-square-meter studio apartment lit only by a single sewing-machine lamp.
Our founder, Mingxi Liu, had just quit her job as a finance analyst. She carried no investors, no family fortune—only a suitcase of vintage sequins inherited from her grandmother, a dress-form nicknamed “Luna,” and the conviction that every woman deserves one moment in which she feels mythic.

Mingxi’s first creation was not for sale. It was a midnight-blue gown sewn for her best friend’s rooftop engagement party. The friend sent a photo; the photo went viral in a local WeChat group. Twenty-seven private messages arrived before sunrise, all asking, “Can she make one for me?” That accidental wait-list became the seed capital. Mingxi sold her bicycle, bought two additional machines, and registered the brand under the letters lmxtsg—her initials plus “tsg,” short for “the secret garden,” the place she imagined every dress could unlock.

The next eighteen months were equal parts chaos and wonder.
• We dyed fabric in rice-cookers because industrial vats were too expensive.
• We bartered evening gowns for photography sessions to build our first look-book.
• We learned that a single mis-aligned bead can make an entire bodice feel off, so we re-stitched 134 dresses by hand before they ever reached a client.

By 2020, lmxtsg had outgrown the apartment. We moved into a sun-lit atelier on the Huangpu riverfront, hired three pattern-makers who once worked for Parisian couture houses, and installed a floor-to-ceiling mirror etched with the words: “Remember the apartment.” It keeps us humble.

Today we design, cut, bead, and ship more than 2,000 gowns a month—from liquid-silk column dresses that skim the floor like spilled ink, to sculptural mini-dresses that flare into galaxies of tulle. Yet every piece still passes through the same ritual: on the final inspection table, Mingxi personally ties the last thread into a tiny bow, a whispered promise that the girl who once sewed under a single lamp is still inside every stitch.

Our atelier now hums until 2 a.m. before major holidays, but the mission never shifted: create the dress that makes you forget the room and remember yourself.