HELSINKI, Finland — Two days before the opening on Wednesday of Oodi, Helsinki’s new central library, its director, Anna-Maria Soininvaara, stood before some of the high-tech equipment that would soon be available for the public to use. She wasn’t entirely sure what it all did, she said sheepishly.

The devices included a laser cutter, computerized embroidery machines and equipment to digitally sculpt wood. In one glassed-in area on the building’s second floor, Helsinki residents could repair personal electronic items by 3D-printing replacement parts and soldering them together.

Ms. Soininvaara’s uncertainty was understandable: The 59-year-old, who has worked in the Finnish library system for three decades, is more of an expert on literature than on high-tech engraving, and Oodi — which means “ode” in Finnish — isn’t exactly a normal library. Given its breadth of services, one might be forgiven for wondering whether Oodi should be considered a library at all.