When you think of Croatia, what comes to mind? Perhaps it’s the quiet villages scattered along the Adriatic Coast or the energetic cities alive with tourists, music, and activity that trickles late into the warm nights.
While Croatia’s coastline offers both, there are also places where history lingers long after the crowds have disappeared and the buildings have begun to fade into ruins. The Kupari resort complex — once a thriving Mediterranean getaway — have long stood abandoned on a breathtaking beach, making it a hauntingly beautiful reminder of its former state that invites the imagination to wander back to the days when it was filled with life.
Urbex enthusiasts, or urban explorers, searching for places that offer both curiosity and adventure in Croatia can make their way along the Adriatic Coast to catch a glimpse of the abandoned Kupari grounds. What was once a flourishing hotel complex from the 1960s until its destruction in the 1990s was used as a luxurious seaside escape for the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA). It was made up of numerous hotels, including private villas for the former Yugoslav President, Josip Broz Tito. The hotels could accommodate nearly 2,000 guests, and there was also a campground that accommodated up to 4,000 guests. It was the place where military hotshots would go to relax and take in all that the Adriatic Coast had to offer.
While the Kupari resort complex fell into ruins after being destroyed, the breathtaking beach remained undisturbed, and its characteristically Croatian pebbled shores are still visited by plenty of tourists to this day. Tourists aren’t only drawn to the site for a touch of dark tourism and its dilapidated, crumbling structures. Kupari Beach, or Plaža Kupari in Croatian, also offers a quiet seaside reprieve from the tourist-filled streets of nearby Dubrovnik.
The silent remains of Kupari’s abandoned luxury
Situated in the “Bay of Abandoned Hotels,” the remnants of a once-flourishing hotel resort remain along the picturesque Dalmatian Coast. It hosted elite guests, such as Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, as well as the “who’s who” of the former Yugoslav military. The Kupari resort complex had five main hotels: Hotel Goričine, Hotel Goričine II, the Pelegrin, the Kupari, and the Grand Hotel. The once-polished lobbies and crowded terraces filled with sun-seeking guests at Kupari’s resort were left as neglected ruins overtaken by nature after shelling and bombing during the 1991 to 1995 Croatian War of Independence, or Domovinski rat (Homeland War) to us Croats.
The hotels that once had beautiful tiled flooring, grand staircases, and rooms boasting balconies with million-dollar views to the crystalline bay have now been reduced to rubble following their 2025 demolition.
By Tosh Bene
