Craft Around the Country

Crystal Bridges Expands Its Campus—and Its Craft Collection

The Arkansas art museum has announced a 114,000-square-foot expansion, and the acquisition of 140 works from craft artists.

By Robert Alan Grand
July 22, 2026

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Museums & Galleries

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Photo courtesy the artist and Venus Over Manhattan, New York

Basil Kincaid, Melanin Activation, 2020–2022, artist’s clothing, Ghanaian wax block fabric, Nigerian lace, cotton, embroidery floss, and sequins, 106 x 91 x 1 in.

The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas, opened a major building expansion led by Safdie Architects in June, adding 114,000 square feet of new exhibition and educational space to the popular museum—and making room for a substantial acquisition of craft pieces across ceramics, glass, fiber, metal, and wood.

More than 140 works from 60 artists have been added to the museum’s collection as part of this recent purchase, showcasing the breadth and innovation behind craft practices today while also providing a more dynamic understanding of American art, says Jen Padgett, the museum’s Windgate Curator of Craft.

Highlights include monumental works from legendary craftspeople like Gee’s Bend quilters Candis Mosley Pettway and Loretta Pettway Bennett, Arkansas woodworker Leon Niehues, Tlingit glass artist Preston Singletary, and sculptor Betty Woodman, alongside works by rising stars like fiber artist Basil Kincaid, metalsmith Jaydan Moore, and Diné weaver Melissa Cody, among many others. Funding for this massive collection came from the Windgate Foundation, along with other philanthropic groups and private donors.

Photo by Dan Bradica

Betty Woodman, House of the South, 1996, glazed earthenware, epoxy resin, lacquer, paint, 159 x 260 x 9.5 in.

The goal, Padgett says, is to present these works in new spaces that intertwine them with masterpieces already in the collection, allowing viewers “to start from a point of curiosity—not reinforcing hierarchies or thinking about very strict categories,” as is typical in many museums.

“By placing amazing carved wood spoons by Norm Sartorius in a section where there are also paintings by Georgia O’Keeffe, we have the ability to present a story that’s not apologetic but a wholehearted embrace of this more expansive vision,” she says.

The museum’s new expansion also includes The Hub, a 14,000-square-foot makerspace that features a dedicated ceramics studio and versatile workspaces for fiber arts, glass, printmaking, and more hands-on activities and workshops, building on the craft techniques on display in the collections.

“My hope is that visitors will see craft as the beating heart of American art—as something that crosses time periods and invites more expansive ways of thinking about creativity,” Padgett says.

Photo by Edward C. Robison III

Norm Sartorius, Kingwood Miniature, 1999, kingwood, 3.5 x 1.25 x 0.75 in.

Robert Alan Grand is a writer and photographer based in Asheville, North Carolina. He received the 2025 Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant to cover contemporary art in southern and central Appalachia.

Learn more about Crystal Bridges online.

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This article was made possible with support from the Windgate Foundation.

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