The purpose of the archives maintained by the Craft Museum of Finland is to record the Finnish craft culture, craft tradition and related knowledge and skills. The collections are managed and maintained for research use and are available to all customers. The scope of the archive collections of the Craft Museum of Finland is about 150 shelf meters. The collections of the document archive are divided into two separate entities, both the museum's own and external collections.

The Imperial Senate ordered on 14th December 1888, that an allowance be granted for the operation of a handicraft museum beginning in 1890.The resulting museum operated under the Society of Industrial Art and was located at the Museum of Art and Design (operating today as the Design Museum).