These two benches were born from the fact that people constantly define themselves by that which surrounds them: physically, contextually, metaphorically. For example, I am Chinese by heritage but technically Canadian by birth. I grew up learning and appreciating both chopsticks and forks, Buddhism and Catholicism,  dim sum and hamburgers, Chinese dance and ballet. For a long time, I struggled to understand how to define myself and which culture I should identify and devote myself to. I came to an understanding some time ago when writing an essay:

 

"Now, you live in the spaces between heartbeats. You cannot embrace the rhythm of your heartbeats because to do so would be to fall into one culture completely and forget the other while you are there: one beat you are completely Chinese; the other beat you are completely westernized. In the space between heartbeats, you are both cultures and yet neither at the same time, a no-man’s land. As brushstrokes define a painting, the heartbeats of your cultures bracket the spaces – they define you."

 

Alone, the bench is designed to fit into a corner to form a bracket of space for an individual to define himself or herself in. Together, the benches define the relationship between two people by the way the users arrange the benches in relation to each other. Instead of existing as a single word, they begin to form a sentence instead.