The Craft and Folk Art Museum in Los Angeles, now Craft Contemporary, re-opened on February 11, 1999 after a period of closure and financial uncertainty. The institution had originated from Edith Wyle's Egg and The Eye gallery and restaurant, became a nonprofit museum in the 1970s, and built a distinctive identity around contemporary craft, folk art, artist-led workshops, and multicultural public programming. After an earlier renovation and reopening in 1995, the museum closed again at the end of 1997 and was widely thought to be finished. Its 1999 return followed a partnership involving museum leadership and the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, preserving a rare West Coast institution devoted to craft as contemporary art practice.
The reopening kept Los Angeles's specialized craft-art museum alive for its later transformation into Craft Contemporary.