A variety of experiments attempts to find out what the Dark Matter that fills our Universe is made of, resulting in a vibrant field of research. This talk will review what we know (or do not know) about the nature of Dark Matter, before introducing the basic principles for its direct detection in laboratory-scale detectors, focusing on Weakly Interacting Massive Particles. I will then review the XENON project, with the ongoing XENON100 and the future XENON1T experiments.
