Small Yellow Shaker Box

While the Shakers designed many objects of simplicity, utility, and beauty, they are perhaps best known for their distinctive oval storage boxes secured with swallowtail "fingers," or laps. Oval box making began in the 1790s at the New Lebanon, New York, community (the Shaker's spiritual center) as one of the first Shaker industries, and survived well into the 20th century. While boxes were produced for use by the Shakers themselves, the vast majority were marketed and sold to outsiders, becoming one of the Shakers' most profitable commercial products. These five boxes, of standard graduated sizes, were designed when not in use to nest perfectly one inside the other. Though men and women lived separately in Shaker communities, they believed in gender equality; they also believed in celibacy, common property, and the second coming of Christ.