The villa now houses the Museo di Archeologia Ligure, and is located at Via Pallavicini 13, immediately next to the railway station in Pegli, a suburb of Genoa, Italy.

Although recognizably in the English romantic style, the garden is highly theatrical, to the point of being organized as a series of scenes forming a play with prologue and three acts (Return to Nature, Memory, Purification).

When the park opened in September 1846, on the occasion of the VIII Congresso degli Scienziati Italiani, it quickly gained national fame.

The grotto represents a Dantesque inferno, with walkways and subterranean lake through which the visitor may ascend to paradise.

The park also contains a number of plantings of botanical interest, including mature specimens of Araucaria bidwilli, Cedrus libani, Cinnamomum camphora, Jubaea chilensis, Notelaea excelsa, Firmiana simplex, Quercus suber, Podocarpus macrophyllus, many exotic palms and a stand of some 160 Camellia japonica.