South Ayrshire Image 
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South Ayrshire Image March 13, 2012
1. Royal Scots Fusiliers Memorial and the Station Hotel
Date: Unknown
©Kenneth Allen
2. Robert Burns Statue
Date: 25 September 2010
©Mike Bailey
More a triangle than a true square, this location is a busy thoroughfare where routes from the south and east enter the town through a complex series of roundabouts. The island area, within the roundabout houses the Odeon Cinema, a cluster of estate agent's offices and Burns House, one of South Ayrshire Council's administrative Offices.
The square contains two statues. The main feature of the square is the small garden with the statue of Robert Burns, presented by the Ayr Burns Club. It was unveiled on 8th July 1891, before a crowd estimated at 40,000. The bronze sculpture by George Lawson is over nine feet tall and faces towards the poet's birthplace, Alloway. It stands on a granite pedestal designed by the Ayr architect James A. Morris, with four bronze plaques showing Burns' parting from Highland Mary and scenes from his poems Tarn O' Shanter, The Cottar's Saturday Night and The Jolly Beggars.
Behind the statue is the Odeon, now Ayr's only cinema. It opened in July 1938, when purpose-built cinemas were replacing converted theatres.
At the eastern end of the square, beyond the garden, stands the South African War Memorial (1902), a tribute to the Royal Scots Fusiliers who died in the Zulu Campaign of 1879, the Sudan 1884-89, the Burma War of 1885-89, the Tirah Campaign of 1897 and the South African War of 1899 -1902.
The Station Hotel, built for £50,000 between 1883 and 1886 is an impressive French Renaissance building with a mansard roof. It provides a grand front to the railway station, which moved here from the North Harbour in 1857 and was greatly extended from 1881.
Text based on Historic Ayr, published by Ayrshire Archeological and Natural History Society, July 2001