[1] The brick and timber farmhouse was erected beside the Logan River in the early 1870s for immigrant German farmer Christian Kruger and his family.

It was built using construction methods and materials traditional to rural northern Germany, from where the majority of settlers along the Logan River in the middle of the 19th century emigrated.

Expanding agricultural production within Queensland's pastoral-based economy was necessary to reduce the colony's dependence on imported foodstuffs, and to encourage cash cropping of export commodities such as cotton and sugar.

In the same year, an area of approximately 20,000 acres (8,100 ha) along the lower reaches of the Logan River 17 miles (27 km) southeast of Brisbane was surveyed into farm portions.

Immigrants from England, Ireland and Scotland were the targeted group, but the Act also provided for emigration from Germany at the rate of no more than 2,000 adults per annum.

Large numbers of German immigrants followed them to the area, settling around Bethania, Beenleigh, Yatala, Eagleby (formerly Philadelphia), Alberton, Carbrook (formerly Gramzow), Stapylton (formerly Yellow Wood) and Pimpama.

Most of these immigrants were attracted by the opportunity to acquire cheap farmland in Queensland - very few appear to have emigrated for religious or political reasons at this period.

For the first two years the Kruger family resided at Bethania, where Christian worked as a farm labourer in the closely knit German community.

In 1867 he selected portion 203, parish of Mackenzie, a parcel of 31 acres (13 ha) on the north side of the Logan River at Gramzow, some miles downstream from Bethania.

This Act enabled any Crown land offered for sale by auction or selection and not sold within 30 days, to be opened for lease.

[1] Like most of the German settlers on the Logan River reserve, the Krugers erected a slab and bark hut as their first dwelling, and concentrated on clearing the scrub, fencing the land and planting their first crop, which probably was maize.

According to a local tradition, the present farmhouse was built in 1871, the year Mrs Auguste Ernestine Kruger (née Raedel), Christian's daughter-in-law, was born.

Fachwerk, meaning shelf-work, involved the raising of an interlocking timber frame that was then infilled with masonry such as brick-nogging or wattle and daub.

The construction of fachwerk houses required the services of a highly skilled craftsman due to the complexity of the jointing and assembly of the structural timber frame.

Von Senden was a neighbour of Christian Kruger, and was resident on the Logan River Agricultural Reserve from at least September 1869, when he made application to select portion 208, parish of Mackenzie.

In partnership with E Schroeder he later held portions 200 and 201, and from 1873 leased a substantial land holding at Mt Cotton as well as his Gramzow farms.

Von Senden supervised the erection of the frame for St Paul's at Gramzow, and although clearly a farmer - with interests in a sugar mill at Mount Cotton as well - is listed in the 1889 Queensland Post Office Directory as a carpenter.

Also unlike the South Australian buildings, which usually rested on a stone plinth, the Gramzow house is elevated on timber stumps.

This standard method utilized in most Queensland timber buildings is also a feature of some German fachwerk houses, especially those located on flood plains.

Von Senden was a native of Holstein where it was common practice for buildings erected in swampy areas and on low-lying islands to be raised on piers.

Consisting of a main level and an attic built under the steeply pitched roof, the house has been constructed using the traditional German building method known as fachwerk.

[1] Fachwerk is a type of half-timbering consisting of the erection of a timber structural frame, the walls of which are then infilled with non-structural masonry panels.

The framing, reputed to be grey ironbark, is generally square in section, hand cut and assembled off site prior to the final erection.

Joints, including cross-halved, checked and mortise and tenon, interlock the timber members giving the frame greater structural rigidity.

Diagonal cross bracing, half-checked where it meets the horizontal nogging, is used externally in the wall panels adjacent to the corners of the building.

Little physical evidence survives of the close-knit communities these immigrants established along the Logan River and the farmhouse is a visible reminder of an important pattern of migration to Queensland during the second half of the 19th century.

The Fachwerk Farmhouse is significant for its potential to reveal information about traditional north German construction techniques, especially from the Uckermark area of Germany, brought to Queensland in the mid-19th century.

Further study of the place may also reveal other structures and archaeological remains that could contribute to our understanding of a way of life no longer practiced in Queensland.

The farmhouse is substantially intact and demonstrates the principal characteristics of a fachwerkbau, or traditional north German half-timbered building.

Due to its unique appearance and the loss of other similar buildings, the place has a special association with early German immigrants who played an important role in the settlement of Queensland and whose descendants still live in the area.