Venetian phoenix finally rises from ashes

''We have state-of-the-art sprinklers, we have water on site, we have a complex system of heat and smoke detectors. We've done all we can,'' said Gianni Cagnin, the engineer who has overseen the rebuilding of the theatre, which was destroyed by a blaze in 1996.

Riccardo Muti, the conductor, yesterday led the Fenice orchestra and chorus in Beethoven's overture, The Consecration of the House.

Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, the Italian president, joined hundreds of guests at the gala performance, which also included works by Stravinsky, Caldara and Wagner, whose musical lives were all touched by time spent in Venice.

Opening night will be followed by a week-long series of concerts including performances by visiting orchestras and conductors, and a solo performance by Elton John.

On January 1, Lorin Maazel will conduct the Fenice orchestra in a televised New Year's concert. Then La Fenice will shut down again until November, when Maazel will inaugurate the opera season in the reborn theatre with Verdi's La Traviata, first performed there in 1853.

In January 1996, La Fenice was reduced to ashes in a fire later found to have been set by two electricians trying to avoid a fine for a delay in their work.

Flames destroyed the nineteenth-century building, itself a replacement for a theatre gutted by fire. It has now been rebuilt ''as it was, where it was'' - the watchword for any restoration project in Venice - but with plenty of twenty-first-century twists. Above the azure and gilt ceiling of La Fenice's auditorium hangs an ultra-modern spray system which can pump out highly pressurised water that evaporates and cools any fire with very little liquid, potentially saving millions of pounds of water damage.

Muti, in town for rehearsals, said he felt very emotional about the rebirth of La Fenice, where he conducted for the first time in 1970 at the beginning of his musical career.

''Every time a theatre opens or reopens, especially in a world so full of tragedy, a place where beauty must resound is an encouraging sign of hope,'' he said.

Over the years, the rebuilding has been delayed by red tape, political disputes and the difficulty of reaching the site, which sits between two canals connected by tiny bridges. Despite an outpouring of sympathy and donations from around the world, Venetians began to despair that they might never get their theatre back. But in the past two years, work based on the project of Aldo Rossi, an Italian architect who died in 1997, has finally allowed La Fenice to reopen.

Using sketches and photographic documentation, the project sought to reproduce the original theatre built in 1792, from its inlaid wooden floors and frescoed ceilings to the minute papier-mache gilded detailing of the loges.

Seating has been increased to 1100 and new rehearsal and conference rooms have been created below the orchestra floor. The new stage curtain was donated by Laura Biagiotti, an Italian fashion designer.

In the sumptuous dusty rose and lagoon green ballroom, sprinkler heads poke out from stucco rosettes on the ceiling, while under the main hall lies a concrete tank containing all the water La Fenice should need to stop any future fire.

''In the worst case scenario, we also have pumps to suck salt water out of the canal. The whole thing is automatic so 1996 should never happen again,'' said Nerio Bison, one of Cagnin's engineering team.

as they were

Recently finished restoration projects in Venice include:

Church of Santa Maria dei Miracoli.

Jacopo Tintoretto, Birth of St John the Baptist, in the Chapel of Sant' Atanasio in the Church of San Zaccaria.

The Scuola Tedesca (German Synagogue) in the Jewish Ghetto.

Giovanni Antonio de Sacchis, called Pordenone, St Martin and St Christopher panels in the Church of San Rocco.

The Badoer Giustinian Chapel in the Church of San Francesco della Vigna.