We report an experimental and numerical analysis of a planar metamaterial designed for normal-to-plane propagation, and operating at microwave frequencies. The metamaterial consists of cutwire and wire patterns, which are arranged periodically on both sides of a dielectric layer, in the form of a bilayer. The left-handed transmission band of the metamaterial is demonstrated experimentally. The effective index of refraction retrieved from the S parameters is found to be negative within this transmission band. An independent negative refraction experiment supports the existence of the negative index of refraction for the metamaterial.