Grotto At Former Hagley Hall (Ngr0395 1800)

The grotto at the former Hagley Hall, dating from the late 18th century, is carved from red sandstone bedrock with seams of gravel. It consists of a series of interconnected underground chambers. A plain roughcast arched portal in a steep bank leads into an aisled antechurch featuring groin vaults. At the end of the antechurch is a rotunda, which is a circular chamber supported by a colonnade of six Tuscan columns with plain capitals and abaci, holding up an entablature and a saucer-shaped dome.

At the north end of the antechurch, a vaulted passage turns north, leading to an antechamber with arcaded walls, a cornice, and a hipped ceiling. From the antechamber, a tunnel-vaulted passage leads to the basilica, which has three-bay aisle arcades with large square piers, plain capitals, round arches, and groin vaults in both the nave and aisles. At the liturgical east end of the nave, there is a round-headed apse containing a pedestal-type altar. An inclined passage from the antechamber leads up to the surface.

James Wyatt designed an octagonal drawing room in 1771 for Assheton Curzon of Hagley Hall, which was demolished around 1932.