I'm quite a bit of an experiment guy, therefore i have A LOT of exotic plants from all over the world. A seed junky i might be; recently ordered seeds worth £140 !! Everything from Giant Bamboo's, ferns, palms, canna lilly's to ornamental grasses and yucca's... A little bit on "my" climate situation; i live in southwestern Norway and thereby avoid the lowest temp's.... From our weather statistics (http://www.yr.no) my location has a annual miniumum of -7,6 degrees, and a maxium of +25,7 degrees. Avarage temp's in july and august is 15- 16 degrees. If we're "lucky" we see maybe 6-7 days a year with snow, and for the rest we got a 50/50 mix of sun and rain... Right now i have -outside- in my southwest faced house wall bedding: 1 trach. fortunei, 1 magnolia, 2 canna lilly's, 1 silk oak, 1 bottlebrush shrub, 1 agapanthus, and 1 eucalyptus tree, all of them plantes this very spring as i just recently got "into" exotics.... And what a thrill it is!
Your weather sounds remarkably like ours this year, only we are getting about 90% days of rain this year. Good luck can we have some pics when you have time. 
