Rocaille

Rocaille, in Western architecture and decorative arts, 18th-century ornamentation featuring elaborately stylized shell-like, rocklike, and scroll motifs. Rocaille is one of the more prominent aspects of the Rococo style of architecture and decoration that developed in France during the reign of King Louis XV (1715–74). Rocaille has been defined as a reaction both to the classic rigidity of the waning Baroque style and to the new interest in nature and the natural sciences. In French,...