Anyone in Northern Cal grow Hydrangea paniculata?

Does anyone grow Hydrangea paniculata here? I've been thinking of getting a standard for my garden (still researching varieities) but need to know how much sun they can take. Would full SW sun (early morning to late afternoon) be too much sun? I've read a lot about them, and by all accounts, they will do well in, but I'd really like a local opinion. I'm on the Peninsula in the Bay Area.

Thanks all

I don't grow that one but since nobody else has jumped in yet I'll throw in my 2 cents anyway! In my mind, it all comes down to how hot your summer temperatures are--if you have relatively cool temps in the summer (rarely gets above mid-80's), and everything you're reading says it will do OK in full sun, then you should be fine. If your summer temps are warmer though, full sun and a southwest exposure may be a little too much for it. Where I am in the more inland part of the East Bay, it gets warm enough that some plants that say "full sun" on the tag really prefer partial shade during the hottest part of the day to do well. But you're much closer to the coast and my guess is your summer temps are relatively cool.

Hi ecrane3. Is mid 80's classified as cool? Laughing - it's not to me! That could be why I'm struggling with this. I think anything over 75 is hot. We're 5 minutes from the water on the airport side of the bay, but really protected from any wind, so my front yard cooks in summer. That said, I successfully grew elephant ears this summer out there without having to water twice a day.

Well, if you think anything over 75 is hot, then I think you'll be just fine with the SW exposure (assuming paniculata's do really like full sun...I grow macrophylla's and serrata's which prefer part shade). The reason I mentioned mid 80's is because that's when some plants can start to suffer from the heat if you have too many days where the temp gets higher than that. Over here our avg summer temp is in the high 80's, although we have a fair number of days that stay considerably cooler than that, but then we'll go through a few days of high 90's or low 100's here and there which brings up the average (and this past summer during the heat wave it hit 115 here for a couple days!)