Lourdes Grotto

A Lourdes Grotto is a replica of the Massabielle Grotto where the Lourdes apparitions occurred in 1858, in the town of Lourdes in France Some Lourdes Grottoes are almost identical reproductions of the scene of the apparitions, others are completely different.

photography — Our Lady of Lourdes Shrine Complex, San Jose del Monte City, Bulacan, Philippines. Public Domain.

At the city of Lourdes in southern Frane, there was a young girl named Bernadette Soubirous. One day she was collecting fire wood near the Grotto of Massabielle when she felt strange gushes of wind, then she saw a lady dressed in white, wearing a white dress, a blue girdle and a yellow rose on each foot. She was standing in the grotto and a bright light emanated from behind her. This story soon spread, and the veneration of Mary at Lourdes started. Books were written, churches built, Popes came and visited. The veneration of Mary spread over the World, and Lourdes became one of the world's leading Catholic Marian shrines.

So what is actually required to call a place a Lourdes Grotto? In our opinion there are three mandatory rules to make a site a Lourdes Grotto:

it is a place of the veneration of Our Lady of Lourdes.
it has a niche.
the niche contains a statue of Saint Mary.

These three conditions are basically sufficient to call a place of veneration a Lourdes Grotto. It should be noted that the Madonna of Lourdes must actually be venerated, i.e. not simply Mary, in which case one would speak of Marian veneration, but Mary of Lourdes. There are numerous optional attributes which support the fact that it is a Lourdes Grotto. However, these are neither necessary nor sufficient.

there is a sign saying it's a Lourdes Grotto.
there is a sort of natural rock wall, even if it is an artificial wall it is built of natural rocks.
there is a huge niche or shelter with an altar and the small niche with the statue is above on the right side.
There is a display with an original rock from Lourdes.
There is a holy spring, the water is sacred, holy, or at least has healing properties.

There are different degrees of "likeliness", or if you will, different degrees of abstraction. Wikipedia says it this way: "Some Lourdes grottos are almost identical reproductions of the scene of the apparitions, with statues of Our Lady of Lourdes and Bernadette Soubirous in a natural or artificial cave, while others may differ from the original in size, shape or style." We classified the Lourdes grottoes into four groups. This classification is not official in any way, it's just a simple way to keep different kinds of grottoes apart. This definition is quite straight forward, the names are intended to be self-explaining.

Replicas: a replica is an almost identical copy of the Grotte de Masabielle, so if you have a frontal photo you are not able to see the difference.
Structural Copy: here the structure of the cave is copied, probably by an abstract huge arch for the altar and a small niche for the stature, above to the right.
Nice Try: in this case they were not ably to make a somewhat realistic copy, due to lack of money or simply knowledge how the original looks like, but at least they tried to make a niche of natural stones for the madonna statue.
Kitschy: this is simply called a Lourdes Grotto, but except for the name and the statue of madonna there are no similarities, instead there are candles, devotionalia, and religious knick-knacks.

And a last comment: Lourdes grottoes are actually grottoes as we define them here on showcaves.com. A grotto is an artificial cave which is in general rather small and heavily decorated with rocks, minerals, fossils, sculptures or artworks. All Lourdes Grottoes, even if they use an originally natural shelter or overhang, are artificial, more or less well-done copies of the original. They are decorated, with the additional religious purpose in mind.