Opened on 23 April 2003, the building was designed by architect Josep Llinàs, who received the City of Barcelona Architecture and Urban Planning Award for the Fort Pienc block building complex, which includes a nursing home, the library, a market a nursery school and a civic centre.

The building has a distinctive linear structure that wraps around the civic centre, with an unusual shape in relation to the rest of the Eixample. The block is bounded by Carrer Sicília, Carrer Sardenya, Carrer Ausiàs March and Carrer Alí Bei, and divided by Carrer de Ribes.

The library specialises in contemporary architecture and design, with a dedicated collection for these fields. It also has a national pop-rock collection featuring popular Spanish bands of the last forty years, and a Chinese-language collection created in 2008 to engage with the neighbourhood’s Chinese community and other people interested in Chinese culture and language.