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A grotto or grot is a natural or artificial cave or covered recess.
The importance of these cellars is demonstrated in their number; for example, there are 40 grotti in Maggia, no fewer in Moghegno, and about 70 in Cevio behind Case Franzoni. Some grotti have been opened to the public, as in Avegno, but most have lost their original character as they became rustic restaurants which serve basic local food and drink. A true grotto is dug out under a rock or between two boulders, where subterranean air currents keep the room cool. Often a grotto had a second floor with another one or two rooms for the fermentation cask and tools of the vintage. In front of the grotto were a table and benches of stone, where the farmers could rest and refresh themselves.
The outsides of garden grottoes are often designed to look like an enormous rock, a rustic porch, or a rocky overhang. Inside, they are decorated as a temple or with fountains, stalactites, and imitation gems and shells (sometimes made in ceramic); herms and mermaids, mythological subjects suited to the space; and , or river gods whose urns spilled water into pools. Damp grottoes were cool places to retreat from the Italian sun, but they also became fashionable in the cool drizzle of the Île-de-France. In the Kuskovo Estate, there is the Grotto Pavilion, built between 1755 and 1761.
Grottoes could also serve as baths; an example of this is at the Palazzo del Te, in the 'Casino della Grotta', where a small suite of intimate rooms is laid out around a grotto and loggetta (covered balcony). Courtiers once bathed in the small cascade that splashed over the pebbles and shells encrusted in the floor and walls.
Grottoes have also served as , or at Villa Farnese at Caprarola, a little theater designed in the grotto manner. They were often combined with cascading fountains in Renaissance gardens.
The grotto designed by Bernard Palissy for Catherine de' Medici's château in Paris, the Tuileries, was renowned. There are also grottoes in the gardens designed by André Le Nôtre for Versailles. In England, an early garden grotto was built at Wilton House in the 1630s, probably by Isaac de Caus.
Grottoes were suitable for less formal gardens too. Pope's Grotto, created by Alexander Pope, is almost all that survives of one of the first landscape gardens in England, at Twickenham.Frederick Bracher, "Pope's Grotto: The Maze of Fancy Pope's Grotto: The Maze of Fancy", The Huntington Library Quarterly 12.2 (February 1949), pp. 141–162; Anthony Beckles Willson, "Alexander Pope's Grotto in Twickenham", Garden History 26.1 (Summer, 1998), pp. 31–59 Pope was inspired after seeing grottoes in Italy during a visit there. Efforts are underway to restore his grotto.Victoria Lambert "Inside Alexander Pope's hidden grotto" The Telegraph, 15 September 2015 There are grottoes in the landscape gardens of Painshill Park,Alison Hodges, "Painshill, Cobham, Surrey: The Grotto", Garden History 3.2 (Spring 1975), pp. 23–28 Stowe, Clandon Park, and Stourhead.James Turner, "The Structure of Henry Hoare's Stourhead", The Art Bulletin 61.1 (March 1979), pp. 68–77; Malcolm Kelsall, "The Iconography of Stourhead", Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 46(1983), pp. 133–143; Kenneth Woodbridge, "Henry Hoare's Paradise," The Art Bulletin 47.1 (March 1965), pp. 83–116 Scott's Grotto is a series of interconnected chambers, extending 67 ft (20 metres) into the chalk hillside on the outskirts of Ware, Hertfordshire. Built during the late 18th century, the chambers and tunnels are lined with shells, flints, and pieces of colored glass. The Romantic generation of tourists might not actually visit Fingal's Cave, on the remote isle of Staffa in the Scottish Hebrides, but they have often heard of it, perhaps through Felix Mendelssohn's "Hebrides Overture", better known as "Fingal's Cave", which was inspired by his visit. In the 19th century, when miniature and rock gardens became fashionable, a grotto was often found, such as at Ascott House. In Bavaria, Ludwig's Linderhof contains an abstraction of the grotto under Venusberg, which is figured in Richard Wagner's Tannhäuser.
Although grottoes have largely fallen from fashion since the British Picturesque movement, architects and artists occasionally try to redefine the grotto in contemporary design works. Such examples include Frederick Kiesler's Grotto of Meditation for New Harmony (1964), ARM'st post-modern Storey Hall (1995), Aranda/Lasch's Grotto Concept, (2005), DSDHA's Potters Field Park Pavilions (2008) , Callum Moreton's Grotto pavilion (2010), and Antonino Cardillo's Grottoes series (2013–2023).
Many Catholic Church visit a grotto where Bernadette Soubirous saw apparitions of Our Lady of Lourdes. Numerous garden shrines are modeled after these apparitions. They can commonly be found displayed in gardens and churches, among other places (see Lourdes grotto).
The largest grotto is believed to be the Grotto of the Redemption in West Bend, Iowa.
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