Jonathan Kent’s production, revived by Francesca Gilpin for the 2014 Glyndebourne Tour (dedicated to the late Sir George Christie), is as cunning as it is beautiful, thanks to Paul Brown’s brilliant design, sensitively incorporating projections. Over a revolving stage, an oversized plate glass window rotates throughout to suggest different rooms (and even the lake), while a gnarled, dead tree branch (perhaps symbolic of other things twisted and dead at Bly) moves us smoothly indoors and outdoors. Playing elegant games of perspective, Flora’s dollshouse in the drawing-room becomes Bly at a distance for the lake scene, heightening an overall sense of stylised surrealism which fits the work perfectly.

Click here to read my full review on Bachtrack.

1783 Dollshouse restored by Denton Welch, now in the Museum of Childhood, section of the V&A, London