After graduating from UCLA, Lula Washington established the Los Angeles Contemporary Dance Theatre in 1980.
[2][5][8] LWDT is a member of The International Association of Blacks in Dance and hosted the IABD annual conference in 1992, 2005, 2011, and 2018.
[1] In 2021, LWDT received its second-largest gift in company history, a nearly one million dollar grant payable over four years from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
[3] In 1988, the Lula Washington Contemporary Dance Foundation purchased an approximately 12,600 square-foot building on Crenshaw Boulevard in Los Angeles.
[10][11] The building serves as a community cultural center and houses four dance studios, instructional areas, and the LWDT school and administrative offices.