The Chesapeake Bay has one of the highest rates of water level rise in the U.S. due to sea level rise (SLR) and sinking land. Over the next 30 years, 2 feet of SLR is expected along Maryland’s coast. Communities are already experiencing impacts through an increase in high tide flooding events, resulting in closed roads, shoreline erosion, and threatened infrastructure. Natural and nature-based features (NNBF), such as marshes, dunes, and living shorelines offer a win-win solution by buffering people and infrastructure from water and waves while providing valuable wildlife habitat and water quality benefits. To elevate the use of NNBF as a climate adaptation strategy, the Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) launched a Resiliency through Restoration Initiative to implement and monitor innovative restoration projects. The Chesapeake Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve developed monitoring protocols and partnered with University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science to collect field data (elevation, vegetation, accretion, and sediment) at priority sites and evaluate project effectiveness. Additionally, DNR partnered with George Mason University and The Nature Conservancy to study wave attenuation and flood reduction benefits of marshes and evaluate SLR impacts on those services. The project team collected field data (hydrodynamic, vegetation, and topo-bathymetric), ran coupled local and regional hydrodynamic and wave models (ADCIRC + SWAN, XBeach), and worked with Warren Pinnacle to rerun the Sea Level Affecting Marshes Model (SLAMM) to better understand how SLR will impact the wave attenuation capacity of marshes in the future. Results from these comprehensive monitoring and research efforts are directly informing site-level adaptive management activities, statewide restoration implementation guidance, and statewide conservation and restoration priorities. This presentation will address how research is informing climate adaptation.