It's all about water
A fair first question about growing tea in the Pacific Northwest is will it survive the winter? Depending on your specific climate, the answer is probably, maybe with just a little help. Tea is officially hardy down to about five or ten degrees fahrenheit. That covers quite a bit of western Cascadia, especially at lower elevations. At my home in Portland, Oregon, I have never given my tea plants winter protection. I did have a tea bush split under the weight of 14 inches of snow, but even that hasn't dampened its spirits. As far as where to plant them, it is my belief they are fairly adaptable to soil and sun conditions. I have some planted in poor soil, some in pretty good soil, some in blazing summer sun and some in dappled shade. They all make usable leaves. I think the ones in the deepest shade put out leaves more slowly, but they still actively grow, and do not appear to mind the shade.
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The much bigger issue growing tea in Cascadia is our very dry summers. Despite our reputation for a rainy climate, many parts of Cascadia are actually quite dry during the period when tea plants do the most growing. The first flush comes around May, and the rain shuts off around the fourth of July, leaving months of potential harvest completely unsupported by rains. If you want to grow tea, you have to give it summer water. Tea flushes (puts out the tender new leaves you want) in response to three things: warmth, water, and picking. If one of those three is missing, the plants will not flush. To repeat, you must have all three to get remotely delicious tea from your Cascadia plants: water, warmth, and picking.
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Water: This is not a problem for us from October to June. Unless April or May is unusually dry, you will likely get your first harvest without supplemental irrigation. To make good tea, you need tender leaves, and tender leaves are possible only with water. Tea is a camellia. Leaves that are mature or dry will be tough. Young, tender leaves are produced by adequately watering the plant, and picking the leaves before they are too old. Leaves that flushed in drier conditions will be tough, and you will not be able to get the magic out.
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You must irrigate your tea in summer. Many tea growing regions enjoy summer rains. Not so in Cascadia. We can go months without rain. If you do not water your tea plants, they will look awful. Their leaves will sunburn. They tolerate full sun fine if they have adequate irrigation. How you water is up to you. Mulch can be helpful. Some of mine are just in the lawn. Some are in a fancier bed with deep mulch and soaker hoses. Some get watered with a watering can. But they are all watered every other day in the dry season.
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Warmth: You can look online for an idea of when you might get your first harvest, but you really won't know until you go look at your plants and see the new leaves flushing. I've had first harvests in May, and some years in June. It depends if the spring is warmer or colder. Just because they are having the first harvest in Japan doesn't mean your bushes have even stirred from winter yet. Watch your plants.
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Picking: Tea won't grow if you don't pick it. You read that right. If you are a hobby gardener, you probably learned the wisdom to leave perennials be and not harvest them until they show new growth. If you do that with your tea plants, like I did, you will be waiting for years and years. Tea is irrevocably linked to humans, and it grows when we pick it. When you get your young plants, you can pick off the damaged leaves and let them rest for a year if you want them to get established and put energy into the roots. But the next year when you start watching in the spring, nothing will happen if you haven't picked the leaves. In early spring, go out to your plants and pick those old, tough leaves off. You can prune with shears or scissors, or pick with your hands. Pick off some leaves. That is the signal to the plant to make new leaves. Watch your plants. When you see those new leaves, pick them and process them (or not, if you have too few or the plant is very young.) The plant will make more leaves. It will keep making more leaves in response to picking as long as it has warmth and water.
Tea plant showing sun damage. This is avoided not by shading the plants, but by giving them adequate water.
Tea at home in the garden, with a plum tree and violets for neighbors.
Tea is ready to pick when you have a new shoot consisting of a pointed bud at the tip, with a small, tender leaf below it, and a larger, but still tender leaf below that. This is the meaning of the expression "two leaves and a bud" in reference to tea. Of my 22 tea bushes, not all of them do a textbook "two leaves and a bud." Sometimes the flush looks like three very small leaves in a cluster. Some new growth may be three leaves, but some may be two. Tenderness is much more critical than size. In many places, tea is still picked by hand, as you will do in your home garden. The stem is grasped below the larger, tender leaf and snapped off with the fingers. If you are picking at the right time, with the right amount of moisture for the plant, the stem will easily snap off. If you are below the point of the tender new growth, or if you waited too long, the stem will not snap off easily. Remember this detail. As you work with harvest after harvest, you will pick up on this difference. More industrial tea farms use mechanical harvesters that cut the bushes to a uniform height. Later the tea is mechanically sorted. The leaves from very young plants are not generally used because mature plants have more flavor. However, I encourage you to start working on your processing skills anyway. Processing tea is hard if you are a tea enthusiast and you know what good tea tastes like. You might fail with quite a few batches before you get the hang of it. You have to pick the plants to stimulate growth, anyway. You may as well give it a shot.
This variety of camellia sinensis makes pink flowers, and the new growth has a purplish hue. See how the reddish tender leaves and stem differ from the older, greener leaves below.
This tender shoot has one leaf bud, two tender leaves, and a fourth leaf that is probably tender enough but may not roll well.
Pruning: You can absolutely prune your tea bushes in late winter. Just like any perennial shrub, tea will need some pruning for shaping, removal of damaged branches, and general renewal. The rule of thumb of not removing more than one third of the plant I think is a good one for tea.
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Flowers and seeds: Tea flowers in the cool season! It makes pretty little white or pink flowers. Flowers can lead to seeds. While it's possible to propagate tea with seed, commercial growers don't. Tea is generally propagated by cuttings to preserve desirable traits. But hey if you want to sprout one, have at it! Let me know what happens.
Where to buy plants
I am a fan of Raintree Nursery. Located near Mt St Helens in Washington, they specialize in plants for the Cascadia climate. They carry tea sourced from a garden in Russia.