You might post a picture of what your looking for (or something similar) to get more help.

This is what I want 6" wide 8 feet tall

Wrapped in Hardie or similar fiber cement product?

Do you like this style?

We are also in Louisiana and went with cypress. Ours is rough cut but you could probably make it smooth and paint it and have your carpenter add the detail to the top and bottom. Cypress is easy to find in our area.

Our columns are azek.

Ten yr old picture. Our columns required no maintenance. I would probably use them again. Here's the link.

Here is a link that might be useful: Columns

Yes. Those are pretty. They would look nice with the trim that is around the front door.

Is it best to buy them premade or to have them made on site? I'm getting differing opinions. Some contractors say to use a 6x6 treated pine as the core then have them wrapped on site with redwood and trim the top and bottom with hardiboard. Some say use a pvc column wrap and some say a fiberglass column wrap. I saw a fiberglass column wrap in person and it looks like real wood. I haven't seen a PVC in person yet.

The fiberglass column runs around 190/column. I wonder if that's cheaper than having a wrap made of wood with hardiboard trim on site?

red lover those are aluminum -- that throws another material into the pot to consider. ay yi yi.

annie, azek looks good. i saw those on houzz.

Jdez, I'll look into the cypress. But I think those run around 400/column.

So far I'm leaning toward the Azek

I would purchase the fiberglass columns if it were me. I have seen the wood wrapped columns look atrocious in short order and by the time your done it will cost at least $100 for the material per.