Foamboard or Mounting Board for base PVA glue Plaster Linka Moulds Sand and Flock for base texture

Start by cutting the base to shape. This example used a 12.5x7cm rectangle joined to a smaller rectangle of 8x5cm, but any L-shaped, T-shaped or rectangular base will do equally well. To build the height of the walls up a bit, and add some variety to the masonry, a pattern of 5mm foamboard strips about 8mm high was glued down to form the base of the walls.

In the example on the right, an additional strip of foamboard was glued on so that the wall stepped out. The additional brick panel not only adds interest, but also hides the joint behind and strengthens the wall.

I deliberately made the scale of this ruin slightly ambiguous, so it could be used at 20mm or 28mm. The main thing that would give this away is the size of the doors, so there are no intact examples.

The Linka panels are all ones which didn't come out of the moulds in a single unbroken piece. The most common casualties are the little interlocking teeth that connect the panels together. To avoid lots of peculiar square holes, the panels were arranged to connect sets of intact teeth wherever possible. Generally the panels were in fairly large bits, but these were broken down on diagonal lines to give a more ruined look.

The rubble inside the building is also made up of Linka bits. In addition to sections of brick, there are also some arch fragments, and some sections of Linka log cabin. To supplement this there are a few small rectangles of card and chunks of foamboard. The inside face of the walls was plastered with tile adhesive. This gives a nice, rough texture and also strengthens the rather fragile plaster panels and their joints. Watered down tile adhesive was also used to texture the foamboard wall plinth, to make it look like concrete.

The ground is textured with the standard combination of PVA and sand. It is a bit tricky working it in and out of the rubble - the best tool for this is a worn out size 0 brush.

	The ground (including non-brick rubble) was given a base coat of dark brown
	The walls were base coated with a pale beige, both inside and out.
	The ground was drybrushed with a mid-brown. A wash of the same mid-brown was applied to the concrete areas at the base of the walls.
	The walls were then painted with a brick colour. The brush was lightly dragged over the brick texture, in a sideways motion to prevent the tip going into the grooves between the bricks. Note that the brick colour is not a bright red or orange, which would look unnatural, but a far more muted brown.
	The non-brick rubble was then drybrushed with a mid grey-brown. A few small patches of this colour were also randomly applied to the brick to add weathering.
	Finally a light cream coloured drybrush was applied to the ground, concrete, rubble, and to a lesser extent, the brickwork.

The final touch was to add a few grassy clumps (static grass flock), and a couple of fragments of !lichen.