The corner building was originally constructed with timber-framing with just two storeys over a walk-out basement, with a six-bay-long principal facade towards Nyhavn and a five-bay-long gable towards Lille Strandstræde.

The building is topped by a pitched roof clad in red tiles and features two dormer windows towards the canal.

He mentions the building in the opening stanza of his 1922 poem Nyhavns-Odyssé:[2] In Danish Hotellet "Dagmar Hansen" og Caféen "Mozambique" Stod fjernt i Horizonten om min Barndoms Odyssé Og funklede med skiltene og dunkende musik Og skreg i Sømandsdille til om Natten Klokken tre.

In English The hotel "Dagmar Hansen" and the café "Mozambique Stood far in the horizon of my Childhood Odyssey And sparkled with the Signs and throbbing Music And screamed in a sailor's frenzy until three o'clock at night The building was used as the central location in the eponymous George Schneevoigt-directed 1933 comedy film Nyhavn 17.

Nyhavn 17 was also used as the central location in the Alice O'Fredericks/Lau Lauritzen-directed 1939 comedy film I dag begynder livet.