Montréal - Dorchester Square

Dorchester Square is reached by crossing Boulevard René-Lévesque. In its green gardens stands a statue by Emile Brunnet (1953) honoring Wilfrid Laurier, the French-Canadian statesman and Prime Minister of Canada from 1896 to 1911. Buildings around the square, which is also graced by Henry Moore's sculpture "Reclining Figure" (1962), include the Victorian bulk of the former Hotel Windsor (1878, renovated in 1985), the Neo-Classic Sun Life skyscraper, the city's oldest and put up between 1918 and 1933, and the towering Banque de Commerce Canadienne Impériale (1962), its 45 floors an example of a very fine architectural style that stands out from the often monotonous functionalism of many modern structures.