COLUMNS A simple, and effective way of making Khemrian ruins is to use columns, half buried in sand. Many Khemrian temples and important buildings featured columns, which are huge and tough enough to survive after the building has toppled. MATERIALS: Wedding cake decorating columns (available from cake and craft shops) Plasticard Thick cardboard PVA Sand Polystyrene Beige, orange-brown and white paint.   The columns I bought are hollow, and have circular holes at top and bottom. This presents two problems: Every column you make will have holes in it, and If you make a toppled column, it will be hollow. Very undesirable. SO what you do, is glue pieces of Plasticard on top When the glue is good and dry, carefully carve the plasticard to match the shape of the pillar. Then, glue the pillars to small cardboard bases, plaster, and sand as normal. Alternatively, cut a pillar in half, and glue one end down as normal, with the other on it's side. You'll have to use a saw to cut away part of the top so it can lie flat. Stuff polystyrene down both pieces, and plaster to fill up the holes. You might also want to add polystyrene around the base so you can build sand up around the pillar, making it look half buried.