The piece was made in response to research done on socially manipulative furniture like the Shaker bench.
In the Shaker religion, contact between men and women is forbidden. The Shakers were known for making beautiful furniture, like long communal ‘His and Hers’ benches from which to worship.
The Shaken bench is a response to this division, whereby the form of the Shaker bench has been used but broken in the middle to force the people sitting on it to slide towards each other.
