He was apprenticed as a stonemason with Thomas Gibson, who was then building the Murray Royal Asylum, outside Perth. Around this time he was also commissioned by Robert Graeme, the laird of Garvock to carve a coat of arms on the front of Garvock House.[1] Macdonald then travelled to Edinburgh with a letter of introduction from Graeme to the architect James Gillespie Graham.[2] On 26 February 1822 he entered the Trustees' Academy, Edinburgh.[1] During this time he also worked as a decoratorative carver for Gillespie Graham.[3]
In late 1822 he travelled to France with the Oliphant family of Gask. He then went to Rome where he set up a workshop and remained for the next three years.[3] Whilst there he executed several busts, among others that of the John Murray, 4th Duke of Atholl. In 1823, along with Gibson, Severn, and other artists, he founded the British Academy of Arts in Rome, of which he continued as a trustee until his death.[1]
In 1829, he sent his bust of John Marshall, MP, to the Royal Academy, and he was a frequent contributor to the succeeding exhibitions. In the autumn of 1829, he exhibited in the Royal Institution, Edinburgh, his colossal group of 'Ajax bearing the dead body of Patroclus and combating 'an warrior' and other works; and he was second to his friend Charles Maclaren, editor of The Scotsman in his bloodless duel with Dr. James Browne, editor of the Caledonian Mercury, fought near Edinburgh in November 1829, which arose partly out of an article in the Mercury (6 November) on Macdonald's works and the Scotsman's criticisms upon them. In the same year he was elected a member of the Scottish Academy, where in 1832, he exhibited several busts, including those of John Gibson Lockhart and the Earl of Erroll; but he seldom contributed here, and resigned his membership in 1858. He appeared in the list of honorary members in 1867.[1] At this time he is shown as living at 10 Cumberland Street in Edinburgh's Second New Town.[3]
He also executed busts of Walter Scott (1831), Fanny Kemble, and Sir David Baird. and James Gillespie Graham. Among his ideal works are 'A Girl and a Carrier Pigeon,’ (1835), and 'Eurydice,’ (1849). His 'Ulysses recognised by his dog,’ shown in the Paris Exhibition of 1855, was much admired, and became the property of Lord Kilmorey. [1]
Letitia Elizabeth Landon published her poem Lines. Supposed to be the Prayer of the Supplicating Nymph in Mr. Lawrence Macdonald’s Exhibition of Sculptures in the Literary Gazette in 1831.