Kupari

Kupari is a crescent bay just south of Dubrovnik lined with the concrete shells of half a dozen hotels, built from the 1960s into the 1980s as a holiday resort for Yugoslav military officers and their families. In 1991, during the siege of Dubrovnik, the hotels were shelled and looted, and they never reopened.

Walking the bay today is an eerie experience: grand lobbies open to the sky, marble staircases trailing rebar, and a long pebble beach that still draws swimmers and sunbathers between the ruins. The contrast, a public beach at the foot of a dead resort, is unlike much else on the coast.

Access is open along the beach, but the hotel interiors are genuinely unsafe; floors have collapsed and debris falls without warning. Admire the scale from the outside, and do not treat the buildings as a climbing frame. Redevelopment plans have been talked about for years, so the window to see Kupari like this may close.

For photographers, the row of dead hotels against the blue bay is the wide shot, best in the morning before the beach fills. Pack water and shade; there are no facilities now.

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