The Enid Blyton Society

I've just been looking at the photo of Enid with Green Hedges behind her taken shortly before her death. Although I've seen photos of it before I struck by how it looks (two different architectural styles welded together? Sort of mock tudor and extended? What gives it this look? Was it extended?

Also interested to know what Enid would have paid for it? A large house, like Green Hedges, in roughtly the same part of Beaconsfield (if high spec) would cost more than £5 million in today's money, especially with the 3(?) acre grounds, perhaps more for the land alone. It must have been more than double the price of her Bourne End home I would have thought. Also what was the approximate square footage? around 6,000 sq feet or more? I think it would probably have been only a matter of time before it was bulldozed, builders would be itching to get their hands on the plot. In the road where I grew up in the 1970s the fairly modest houses had unsually large plots (around half to one acre plus). The houses were built in the 1920s and 30s and were attractive although not large. Guess what? They have nearly all been bulldozed! Only one or two remain in their original state. This has changed the whole 'feel' of the road as you can imagine but has made a few builders and property developers very rich.

I visited a lady last year in St Albans, Herts. She lived in a beautiful Victorian house and her garden was about 3 acres plus. She had a kitchen garden, a tennis lawn, and small wood! Wow! She said that there were restrictions in place to stop building (perhaps the only reason it survives like this now). I've seen similar - relatively - small houses on 3 acre plots around the golf course in Surrey where Enid played? (Name escapes me). An old boss once lived in one. Again a lovley 1920s house but around 2,500 sq feet only. I fear that it won't be long before the plot contains 6 modern mansions or similar with basement swimming pools but no garden to speak of. Very sad!

It's interesting how prospective purchasers in Beaconsfield now would pay 2 or 3 million plus for a house (in one of the best roads) which would have all mod cons but a relatively tiny garden (in some cases just a tiny patch of grass). Gardens now appear to be very out of fashion, and people wonder why they would want all the upkeep? I wonder what Enid would have thought? Not in the position to spend that sort of money on a house but if I so I would want at least half an acre of garden!

Also the photos of Enid at Green Hedges have made me think about what happened to it after Enid died? I know it was sold to a developer but wonder how long it was empty for?

I know that Enid lived at Green Hedges from 1938 to 1968. And I believe it was demolished in 1973. At the last EB Day, Barbara Stoney was telling me that she watched the beautiful house being demolished and she took one or two plants from its garden to replant in her own garden. How sad that such a beautiful house as Green Hedges had to be demolished. It would have made a great attraction for all Enid Blyton fans to gather too.

Somebody knows what happened to that statue of a girl who was reading in the gardens of Green Hedges? Thanks

Interesting comments, Belly. We have the same scenario in Australia - people buying McMansions with very little garden. I don't understand it myself, but I don't think you can rule out the link between small gardens and rising levels of child obesity, given people would be scared to let their kids play in the street or go down the local park ...

It is very sad that Green Hedges was demolished. It should really have been preserved and made into an Enid Blyton museum. A lot of the demolition of the 1970s was very sad. Where my mom lives near Birmingham, a huge, centuries-old house that some of Guy Fawkes's men had hidden in and which had a secret passage, came down in the 1970s to make way for a Stalinist-style housing estate. I know it's easy to feel nostalgic about some things from the 1960s and 1970s, but the planners and builders from those decades really knew how to ruin a landscape for ever.

With regard to Misteriojuvenil's question about the statue of the reading girl. I think I read somewhere that it was removed to Gillian Baverstock's garden, I may be wrong (I frequently am!). Can anyone confirm if this was so? And where is it now?

Kate.

Yes, in an interview in Hello! magazine some years back, Gillian said that she had the statue in her garden. I don't know where the "reading girl" is now but I hope she's in someone's garden and not stored in a garage or something.

Anita

I can confirm that the statue was in Gillian's garden as I saw it when I visited her about ten years ago. What I don't know is whether when Gillian moved house to a much smaller place the statue moved with her. I will find out.

It would be interesting to know Tony, thanks.

Green Hedges iwas near to what is now 'New Beaconsfield', I think this area of comparatively new shops etc were not there when she lived there? When I've read about her visits to the butcher etc this would have been the high street in 'Old Beaconsfield'? (The older, more picturesque part of Beaconsfield is/was slightly further away).

Are some of the older houses that can be found on Burkes Road today similar to Green Hedges (albeit in generally smaller plots)? I think I have driven by one or two that remind me of it.

I would think the location of Green Hedges and land/property value in that area would mean it would be unlikely to have ever survived intact as a Blyton museum or similar. Perhaps as a theme park? shudder...!

Was the road where Green Hedges was (Penn Road from memory)? once more residential in the manner of some of the older houses in Burkes Road?

Tony I hope you can some information, like whether there is still this beautiful statue.
Thanks to all

Enid's garden at Green Hedges, must have been full of birds and wild life. How lovely it must have been to sit and watch the day go by in such an expanse of garden. I love watching the birds from our feeders, and at present it's so lovely to see the sparrows feeding their young. Enid must have been in heaven in such a garden being the nature lover that she was.

If I have Dr. Who's tardis that's where I'd go back to for a day, to sit in the garden at Green Hedges on a hot summers day.

According to Imogen Smallwood in her book, 'A Childhood at Green Hedges', Enid Blyton paid £3,000 for the house when she bought it in 1938. This is apparently worth around £523,135 in today's money, based on average earnings (source: http://www.measuringworth.com/ukcompare" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;) - so just over half a million, which is still quite cheap compared to the prices that houses in Beaconsfield go for today (typically between one and two million)!! And as you say, the houses there now, despite being so expensive, seem to have much smaller gardens than they did in Enid's day. The houses in Blyton Close are estimated as being worth between £600,000 and £1m.

Gillion told me that she had the statue of the little girl reading the book in her garden, but that her children (or grandchildren, I forget which) had broken it! She didn't mention the other statue, of the girl listening to the birds. Imogen, in her book, doesn't seem to know her fate either.

There is another thread about GH here which might answer some of your questions: http://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/foru ... f=3&t=2234" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thanks so much. Have house prices really relatively increased so much? Circa £523,000 (although a great deal of money) would not buy you a detached house in the central area. We were looking in the area a few years ago (it was frightening) and I was struck that 1950s, detached 4 bedroomed houses, around 2,500 square feet to 3 (that needed work) in Beaconsfield were going for more than £1 million! These were a good 20 mins walk to shops and not in the best roads either.

I'd be interested in the square footage of Green Hedges, what would your estimate be?

Sad to hear about the fate of the reading girl.

Taking a look at Primelocation £549,000 in central Beaconsfield seems to get you a flat in sheltered accommodation or something 3 bedroomed and not detached. You get more a bit further out.

What, may be not surprising is how innocent security was during those days, probably through Enid's last day at Green Hedges. Maybe, this was because she had lived in an era i.e. the 1930s, the 1940s, 1950s, even almost to the end of the 1960s in an era when security threats such as terrorists, stalkers, serial killers etc were not aswell known or to put it better, more pronounced as is the case nowadays. Despite, as I have read somewhere, Green Hedges was the most well-known home residence in Britain after Buckingham Palace, yet there was no iron fence surrounding it. In fact in The Story Of My life, Enid Blyton recounts how some mischievous boys threw stones at her swans. This incident suggests that it was very easy to enter the grounds of Green Hedges. I also guess there was no security and Enid Blyton most of her time she may have been alone with her family and maybe domestic assistants. Nowadays, celebrities such as Enid Blyton have to lock themselves behind iron gates. i.e. look at J.K. Rowling in her carefully-guarded castle in Scotland. Nonetheless, despite being in a gated community, an intruder managed to penetrate and enter the late Beatles' George Harrison's residence in London. How things have changed since those "innocent" days. I am glad to learn that Old Thatch is well fenced and gated. That prevents creeps of all hues that may want to create either mischief or harm from having easy access to these premises.
Stephen I.

And not forgetting the Salisbury resident who got into Buckingham Palace, and sat on the Queen's bed and talked to her.