The light pink sandstone plinth is beneath a standing Burns in brass, with right foot slightly forward, and the right arm almost crossed above the left across the chest.

The plinth followed clockwise displays reliefs of scenes from his poems, Tam O'Shanter (1790), To a mountain daisy (1786), and The cotter's Friday night (1785).

The speeches made that day emphasised that its erection was not only in honour of Burns's genius, but also to commemorate the impact of Scots on Montreal’s development.

[2] On July 8, 2009, the official first shovelful of dirt was lifted in the $23-million project to restore Dorchester Square and Place du Canada at 10 a.m. near the Boer War Memorial monument.

Replicas of Lawson's memorial were also erected in Melbourne on 23 January 1904, Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1919, Detroit on 23 July 1921, Vancouver on 25 August 1928, and Winnipeg in 1936.