Studio Hummingbird -Designing Gardens to Inspire

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Studio Hummingbird -Designing Gardens to Inspire Garden design in Sussex

Studio Hummingbird is a bespoke garden design studio based in Worthing, West Sussex. www.studiohummingbird.com

Victoria Rumens designs beautiful, personal gardens across Sussex, Brighton, Chichester, Horsham and the surrounding areas.

"We moved from a big established garden to a new build. It's a blank canvas and we don't know where to start."If you've ...
26/10/2026

"We moved from a big established garden to a new build. It's a blank canvas and we don't know where to start."

If you've recently downsized or moved, this might sound familiar. Leaving a garden you loved is a real loss, and a rectangle of turf and fence doesn't quite fill the gap.

Here's the reassuring part: a blank canvas is the best possible start. There's nothing to undo, every choice can be made around you, and you don't have to work it out on your own.

The order I'd go in:
The soil first. New build ground is often compacted under a thin layer of topsoil, and an afternoon with a spade tells you a lot.
Then the structure. One well-chosen tree and softened boundaries give back that feeling of being held.
Then where you'll spend your time. A sunny corner for a Pilates mat, a table big enough for when the family visits.
The planting comes last, and it grows faster than you'd think.

The developer's patio is rarely where the evening sun is. I suspect developers aren't out there at 6pm with a glass of w**e.

I've written the whole step-by-step on my blog this week.
studiohummingbird.com/blog/new-build-garden-where-to-start

Did you start from a blank canvas? What did you do first?

If you'd rather not work out a blank canvas on your own, the first step is a relaxed Discovery Call:
studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire
www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

Who's been visiting your garden this autumn?We've had goldfinches stripping the seed heads and something is very clearly...
25/10/2026

Who's been visiting your garden this autumn?

We've had goldfinches stripping the seed heads and something is very clearly making itself at home in the leaf pile. I'm choosing to believe it's a hedgehog.

When I design a whole garden, I plan for the visitors too: a native hedge, water you can see from the house, one corner left undisturbed.

Tell me your garden visitors below — photos welcome, blurry ones especially.

Prefer a quiet word first? Send me a message. Or book a Discovery Call here:
studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire
www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

Where are you happiest?For me it's an easy answer. Outdoors, somewhere green, ideally leaning over a pond to see what's ...
24/10/2026

Where are you happiest?

For me it's an easy answer. Outdoors, somewhere green, ideally leaning over a pond to see what's living in it.
I'm Austrian, and I grew up in my grandparents' orchard and among their raised vegetable beds. They won gold medals for that garden, and I don't think either of them ever called it work.

It still shapes how I design. On every walk I'm watching which plants have settled together without anyone's help, where the water runs after rain, why one corner feels calm and the one beside it doesn't.

And it clears my head. Soft, moving detail like leaves and water lets your attention rest in a way screens and hard edges never do. That clear head is what I bring to the drawing board when I start on your garden.

So tell me in the comments: where are you happiest, and why do you think that is?

If you'd love your own garden to become that place, a Discovery Call is a relaxed first chat: www.studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

The design, drawn before anything was dug. And the same corner, built.This family garden in Worthing was a lawn, a rotar...
24/10/2026

The design, drawn before anything was dug. And the same corner, built.

This family garden in Worthing was a lawn, a rotary washing line and a garden office at the far end, with nothing in between.

The design gave the walk to the office a reason: a curving gravel path, timber frames to pass through, and halfway down, a fire bowl with a built-in bench for evenings outside.

Seeing it in 3D first is what lets a family say yes with confidence. They had walked around this corner and sat on that bench before a single post went in, so what was built is what they had already seen.

The planting is young here. In a year or two it will soften the edges of the gravel, and that's the part I look forward to most.

If you'd like to see your own garden in 3D before a spade goes in, it starts with a Discovery Call:
studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire
www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

Why I refuse to "tidy" the garden in autumn.Seed heads are bird feeders — goldfinches will work a border of *Verbena* an...
23/10/2026

Why I refuse to "tidy" the garden in autumn.

Seed heads are bird feeders — goldfinches will work a border of *Verbena* and teasel all winter. Leaf piles are where hedgehogs sleep. And the standing stems are the garden's winter structure; wait until you see a frost on them before you decide they're untidy.

It only looks intended if it was planned that way. In the gardens I design, the planting is chosen for how it stands in January as well as how it flowers in July, so one cut-back in early spring is all it asks.

Team tidy, or team leave-it? I know which I am. Tell me yours.

If you'd rather spend autumn weekends in your garden than tidying it, start with a Discovery Call:
studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire
www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

Overlooked? A taller fence is rarely the answer.A neighbour's upstairs window looks straight down onto the patio, and th...
22/10/2026

Overlooked? A taller fence is rarely the answer.

A neighbour's upstairs window looks straight down onto the patio, and the first instinct is to build up. But a fence over 2 metres usually needs planning permission, and it still won't stop a view from above.

Privacy is a question of angles, not height. These are the five answers I reach for:

1. Screen the seat, not the boundary. Close to where you sit, a modest screen hides far more.
2. Pleached trees, which screen from fence height upwards.
3. A canopy overhead, because from upstairs the view is down, not across.
4. A light, multi-stem tree between you and the window.
5. Turn the seat, so the house that overlooks you sits behind your shoulder.

In most gardens it's two or three of these together, chosen for the way the house and the neighbours actually sit. Nobody has ever properly relaxed in a fishbowl.

Which window bothers you most? Tell me in the comments.

I've written it all up on the blog:
studiohummingbird.com/blog/overlooked-garden-privacy-ideas

And if you'd like a private corner of your own, the first step is a Discovery Call:
studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire
www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

October is the month your garden tells the truth.The summer flowers have gone over, and what's left is the garden itself...
21/10/2026

October is the month your garden tells the truth.

The summer flowers have gone over, and what's left is the garden itself: its shape, its light, the places that work and the ones that never have.

It's my favourite month for a first visit, and the one most people spend indoors. If you step outside this week, notice three things:

Where the water sits after rain. That's next year's planting map, not a nuisance.
Which corner nobody sat in all summer. There's always a reason, and it's rarely the furniture.
What you see from the kitchen window now the colour has gone. That view is your garden for the next five months.

Most people who call me already know what isn't working. The hard part is seeing what it could be instead, and that's the part I bring.

What does October show you in yours?

If this sounds like your garden, let's talk it through. The first step is a Discovery Call:
studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire
www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

A garden that's full of life in winter doesn't happen by leaving it alone. It's designed that way.When a garden is plann...
20/10/2026

A garden that's full of life in winter doesn't happen by leaving it alone. It's designed that way.

When a garden is planned as a whole, the things birds and hedgehogs need stop looking like mess and start looking intended:

Seed heads that stand. Grasses and perennials chosen for how they look in frost, not only how they flower in July.
Water in view. Placed where you can watch the birds from the kitchen table.
One cut-back a year. Planting that's meant to stand all winter needs a single tidy, in early spring.
A wild corner, out of sight. Tucked behind the planting, so the hedgehogs have somewhere to sleep and you have a tidy view.
Trees that feed the birds. Crab apple, rowan and hawthorn: blossom for you, berries for them.

The result is a garden that looks better in winter, not worse, and asks less of your weekends.

If you'd rather sit in your garden than work in it, the first step is a Discovery Call:
studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire
www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

What you see is what you get. Our 3D visuals and video walkthroughs are here to see the result before the first spade go...
19/10/2026

What you see is what you get.

Our 3D visuals and video walkthroughs are here to see the result before the first spade goes in the ground. This way our clients can make informed decisions and avoid costly mistakes.
In this concept we swapped the flowering prunus with a stunning acer ‘Bloodgood’ in a slightly raised sleeper bed, but other from that the result turned out like in the concept.

If you want to see more of our stunning garden designs and completed gardens, please visit our website: www.studiohummingbird.com/projects

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire | 01903 535664| www.studiohummingbird.com

Please don't tidy your garden this month.Those brown seed heads you're itching to cut down are a bird feeder, an insect ...
19/10/2026

Please don't tidy your garden this month.

Those brown seed heads you're itching to cut down are a bird feeder, an insect hotel and the garden's winter architecture, all in one. The hollow stems of a *Verbena* or a teasel are where ladybirds overwinter. Frost on a seed head beats bare soil every time.

When I design a whole garden, I plan for this from the first drawing: grasses and perennials chosen for how they stand in January, not only how they flower in July. From November to March, that is the view from your kitchen window.

Put the secateurs away until March. The goldfinches will find you.

If you'd like a garden that looks after itself through winter and gives you your weekends back, start with a Discovery Call:
studiohummingbird.com/book-a-call

Studio Hummingbird | Designing Gardens to Inspire
www.studiohummingbird.com | [email protected]

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