A bolt from the blue

John McCutchan's ancient bluebell woods in East Sussex have been bringing joy, scent and a spectacular carpet of colour for the past 50 years, as Natasha Goodfellow discovers

- Natasha Goodfellow

A WALK through a bluebell wood is, for many of us, a rite of passage of spring. The sight of a sea of blue, where usually there is only green, is magical, disconcerting even, as if the sky is suddenly reflected on the forest floor. On a day when the shafts of sunlight are filtering through the unfurling trees, the birds are singing from the branches and the flowers’ heady, sweet scent is hanging in the air, it’s akin to being in a fairy kingdom— indeed, in Celtic legend, bluebells are known as the fairy flower.

So it is in Beatons Wood, down the winding country lanes outside Hailsham, East Sussex. However, this ancient 23-acre wood of oak, hornbeam and sweet chestnut, which dates to at least 1600 (and is probably far older), holds an enchantment like few others —for the bluebells wash in like a tide after a blanket of white wood anemones. ‘When the wood anemones appear, it’s almost as if snow has come,’ notes John McCutchan, whose father bought the wood from the Michelham Priory estate in 1925. ‘Then the bluebells join them and the wood turns blue and white, before the whole thing becomes a haze of blue.’