Kupari

Kupari occupies a deep bay in Župa dubrovačka between Dubrovnik and Cavtat. Its name recalls the production of kupe, traditional roof tiles: the Republic of Ragusa supervised a local works with twelve kilns and controlled the pricing, transport and sale of its output. Kupari tiles were in particular demand during reconstruction after Dubrovnik’s devastating 1667 earthquake. Tourism arrived with the Grand Hotel, completed with Czech investment in 1920, and the bay later gained landscaped parks, promenades and a substantial resort complex. The surviving former hotel buildings now give the beach a striking and unconventional backdrop. Older landmarks rise above the water: St Stephen’s Church is recorded in 1279, while the 16th-century Church of St Peter occupies the top of Trapit with a view across Župa Bay. Kupari is 11 kilometres from Dubrovnik’s Old Town and 16 kilometres from the international airport at Čilipi.

Kupari was not created solely as a Dubrovnik beach resort: before the landscaped hotel grounds, its bay was an industrial site known for clay, bricks and roof tiles. Clay extraction formed the Kupari pit, while the documented twelve kilns reveal the scale of the former works. Twentieth-century tourism reshaped the shore again, beginning with the Grand in 1920 and followed after the Second World War by the Pelegrin, Goričina and Kupari developments. An earlier layer survives at Goričina between Kupari and Srebreno, where fragments of amphorae, pottery and Roman coins point to an ancient settlement and harbour.