The inspiration for the ubiquitous external stud frame of the Queensland house has previously been assumed to be the half timbered houses of Britain. There was an assumed single point of dissemination throughout Queensland via the work of a British immigrant architect, Richard George Suter. This article demonstrates a direct connection between an 1853 house in Geelong designed by German immigrant architect Frederick Kawerau and the earliest known external stud buildings in Queensland. The earliest of these two buildings, the Rockhampton Railway house (1865), pre-dates Suter’s arrival in Australia and was designed by a German architect, Richard Roericht, who had emigrated from the same town as Kawerau. Roericht spent six years in Victoria before he relocated to Queensland. The second building, the Nanango School (1866) was designed by Benjamin Backhouse. Backhouse had previously practiced in Geelong and his association with Kawerau is well documented. This article challenges what we thought we knew about outside studding in Queensland and recognises the previously unexplored role of German architects in shaping the quintessential Queensland house.