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Staying true to its name, Canberra's Phoenix Pub has risen from the ashes with renewed hope of survival.
Manager Netti Vonthethoff said she was overwhelmed the Canberra community raised $50,000 in weeks to save them from closing due to a complex legal dispute with the landlord and property manager.
"Just weeks ago we were sure we needed to close the next day and it was all very exhausting," Ms Vonthethoff said.
"Now I think we're going to make it through."
The public threw the business a lifeline through fundraising events, online donations and simply grabbing a beer at the venue, with Ms Vonthethoff saying trade had increased drastically since they signalled trouble one month ago.
"All those people that have come forward [to help], the bigness of that, I don't even know how to express. It makes me realise there's no way they would have let us close," she said.
"It's not just my heart that's up there, it's the community's heart and it's been shown."
During a recent fundraising event, ACT Greens leader Shane Rattenbury said the city's live music scene would suffer from the loss of The Phoenix, which had been showcasing local talent for 25 years.
The pub in the iconic Sydney Building on East Row had faced a string of financial setbacks since the premises were damaged by fire in February, 2014.
After being hit by a storm the following year, it was slapped with a $200,000 bill for a period operators say the business was unfit to trade, despite putting thousands of dollars into repairing the venue.
The Phoenix spreads across two premises and the original part — the much larger section — has been mostly closed since the fire.
Last year the property manager, LJ Hooker, terminated that section's lease after claiming the business' renovations were non-compliant with fire regulations.
Ms Vonthethoff said community support had put the businesses in a significantly more stable financial position, making the prospect of reopening that section more likely.
"That other side still has a lot of debt on it, but the trade is now enough to carry the costs of that side where as it hadn't been," she said.
"That's why we are hoping to negotiate [with the landlord] to get back into that space."
But she said for now she was just happy the smaller side's immediate future was secured.
"Pretty much every band that has come though The Phoenix for all of January have donated their time and energy and all the money raised for them has been donated directly to The Phoenix," she said.
"For everyone to have jumped out to help us just shows how much we mean to them and that is just so positive."
Topics: music, community-and-society, canberra-2600, act, australia
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