With the Winter Olympics dominating screens, Dougie Wallace instead took his camera to Scotland’s ski areas of Glenshee, Cairngorm Mountain, Glencoe and Nevis Range, where a thaw, a band of rain, or a gust can change everything

When the snow comes, the car parks fill. Word spreads quickly, a good week, a belter of snow, and by mid-morning the access roads are tight with hatchbacks, hire skis and cautious optimism. In Scotland, the difference between a strong season and a poor one can be a weather front drifting 10 miles too far north. A thaw, a gust, a band of rain, and everything changes.

The project was partly inspired by the approach of the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics and the idea of what they might look like if staged in Scotland. It was not about shiny podiums, more an exercise in imagining how weather, people and place might shape a very different kind of Games.

Cold air, small talk, a few quiet minutes before the ride, Glencoe