Ancona, nestled along the Adriatic coast of central Italy, will be the Italian Capital of Culture for 2028. The capital of the Marche region, in the grand final held at Palazzo Chigi, edged out the other nine candidates in a close finish, among which stood out another medium-sized city like Catania, Forlì, and several small towns. Ancona won over the jury with a solid bid, named Questo adesso (This Now), and with concrete investment prospects to make the city a model of sustainable tourism: a dossier summed up by Culture Minister Alessandro Giuli with a quote from the poet William Butler Yeats: "One must turn actions into dreams and dreams into actions." The jury, in its reasoning, praised a candidacy "capable of combining territorial identity and international openness in a vision that connects cultural policies with broader dimensions of urban regeneration, social inclusion and participation." It was also deemed well-suited to guaranteeing a deseasonalisation of tourist flows: Ancona promises to be a seaside city, yes, but one to be enjoyed in every season of the year, not only in summer.

Wanted in Rome @wantedinrome

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The Italian port city of Ancona has been crowned Italy's culture capital 2028.
wantedinrome.com/news/ancona-cr…

♥ 117💬 2 18 mar 2026 · Apri su X →

But beyond promises and plans for the future, Ancona's strength lies in what it already is in the present — in its being, precisely, "this now." We are talking, for instance, about a city from whose "elbow-shaped" headland jutting into the sea (from the ancient Greek Ankón, meaning elbow) it is possible to admire both sunrise and sunset on the same day, by moving just a few steps. Yet, to this day, Ancona is unjustly visited by most people only to board a ferry to Greece, Salento, Croatia, or as a base for the beaches of Numana and Sirolo. And yet those who have passed through know there is something there: an ancient port, a historic centre that breathes of Mediterranean history, a light on the water that stays with you.

Ancona, a candidacy born from poetry

It is not only Yeats: the dossier Ancona. Questo Adesso takes its name from the verses of Francesco Scarabicchi, an Ancona-born poet who passed away in 2021, and tells the story of a city that wants to stop being a place of transit and become a destination — one that intends to transform its port, historically a place of departures, into a place where people arrive to stay. Founded by the Greeks in 387 BC, recognised as the symbolic capital of the Adriatic by the Dichiarazione di Ancona of 2000 and by the European Strategy Eusair, the city has a deep identity.

Marche Europa @MarcheEuropa

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#euinmyregion #ITIAncona

12 mar 2026 · Apri su X →

The programme is structured around more than eighty original, site-specific projects, spread across four broad thematic areas that mirror the very morphology of the city: the sea, the city, the park, and living culture. Questo mare (This Sea) positions itself as a laboratory for a new relationship between infrastructure and community, where the port is not merely a logistical or commercial space, but also a cultural, artistic and social one. La Via Maestra (The Main Way) is a narrative thread running through the city that connects museums, squares, events and places of memory, guiding residents and visitors through a shared network. With Adesso Parco (Now Park), Ancona puts forward the Cardeto urban park and the Conero Regional Park as symbols of a sustainable balance between nature, landscape and contemporary art. Mare Culturale (Cultural Sea), finally, places digital creativity, new languages and spaces for younger generations at its centre, to build an ecosystem founded on knowledge and the promotion of local talent.

Dante Ferretti and the museum of the Adriatic

RadiantFilm ✓ @RadiantFilm

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Dante Ferretti with his concept artwork for the set design of Sweeney Todd's barber shop in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)

♥ 26 26 feb 2026 · Apri su X →

Among the projects that most impressed the ministerial commission is the Museo della Civiltà del Mare Adriatico (Museum of Adriatic Maritime Civilisation), whose artistic direction has been entrusted to Dante Ferretti — a three-time Academy Award winner for production design, with films including The Aviator, Sweeney Todd and Hugo. A native of Macerata in the Marche region, Ferretti began his career right here in Ancona and shares a visceral bond with this land. The project promises to be one of the most original museums in Italy: not a collection of artefacts behind glass, but an immersive experience devoted to Adriatic civilisation — that millennia-old culture of exchanges, migrations, fishing, trade and the meeting of peoples that the sea has held together for three thousand years. "Ancona is wonderful; my career began here, and I shot my first two films here: 'Le prigioniere dell'isola del diavolo' and 'Il giustiziere dei mari.' Then with Fellini, we drew direct inspiration from Ancona for 'E la nave va' in 1983. Now we are working on a major project — I want to be an ambassador for the beauty of my region."

Why visit Ancona, and why do it now

While waiting for 2028, Ancona is already on the move. The city has just launched Ancona a cielo aperto (Ancona Open-Air), the first integrated bilingual map of urban art scattered across streets, squares and neighbourhoods — an invitation to discover the city as a diffuse museum, accessible on foot. Major exhibitions are in the pipeline, ranging from twentieth-century masters to the Adriatic Renaissance, and the cultural programme leading up to 2028 looks set to be dense and continuous.

Ministero della Cultura @MiC_Italia

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Viaggia tra i luoghi della #Cultura per riscoprire la bellezza del nostro patrimonio.
📷 Oggi visitiamo il Museo archeologico nazionale delle Marche.
↘ cultura.gov.it/luogo/museo-ar…

#22novembre #MiC #luoghidellacultura #LuogoDelGiorno @MANaM_Ancona

♥ 29💬 1 22 nov 2024 · Apri su X →

But there's more. Ancona is one of those cities that surprises precisely because it doesn't take itself too seriously. The historic centre moves at the slow, authentic rhythm of seaside towns that don't depend on mass tourism. The Mole Vanvitelliana — the former lazaretto on the harbour designed by the architect of the Royal Palace of Caserta — is one of the few examples in the world of octagonal architecture on that scale. The Cattedrale di San Ciriaco commands the headland with a view that sweeps across the entire gulf. And then there is the Conero: a natural park twenty minutes from the city centre, with white cliffs plunging into a turquoise sea, entirely immune to the logic of hit-and-run tourism. All of this sits at the heart of a region — Le Marche — that has been cited for years among Italy's most authentic destinations and still manages to be accessible, human, and welcoming. Well worth a visit, probably, even before 2028.