The urbanization along the northern Adriatic Sea, across Veneto Emilia Romagna, Marche and Abruzzo represents a unique, and all too often overlooked, laboratory to study the evolution of the contemporary European city. Adriatica will work as a “think tank” studing the evolution of the urban coastal condition of the Adriatic city: its past, its present condition and future potentials. The Adriatic City has grown and keeps striving under the pressure of social, technological, and economic forces. We set to develop the first comprehensive study and an urban theory describing this vast territory unfolding along the Adriatic.