The project is a result of winning an open, international plan and design competition in 2010. The House for Books and Blues, or Bok & Blueshuset is a three-story house containing library, cinema, live stage, café, museum for blues, sound studio and music tuition.

Notodden Blues Festival and Europas Bluessenter also have their offices here. All the functions of the house are reached from an open vestibule and reception. The architectonic expression of the house tries to pursue elements of the historical industrial architecture, that characterizes parts of Notodden`s dock area also today.

The different functions are organized in their own volumes and can, therefore, be read out of the architecture of the house. Three large lightwells above the reception and vestibule are the signature of the house.