We study the structure and compute the stable rank of $C^{*}$-algebras of finite higher-rank graphs. We completely determine the stable rank of the $C^{*}$-algebra when the $k$-graph either contains no cycle with an entrance or is cofinal. We also determine exactly which finite, locally convex $k$-graphs yield unital stably finite $C^{*}$-algebras. We give several examples to illustrate our results.

We compute a presentation of the fundamental group of a higher-rank graph using a coloured graph description of higher-rank graphs developed by the third author. We compute the fundamental groups of several examples from the literature. Our results fit naturally into the suite of known geometrical results about higher-rank graphs when we show that the abelianization of the fundamental group is the homology group. We end with a calculation which gives a non-standard presentation of the fundamental group of the Klein bottle to the one normally found in the literature.

Results of Fowler and Sims show that every k-graph is completely determined by its k-coloured skeleton and collection of commuting squares. Here we give an explicit description of the k-graph associated with a given skeleton and collection of squares and show that two k-graphs are isomorphic if and only if there is an isomorphism of their skeletons which preserves commuting squares. We use this to prove directly that each k-graph Λ is isomorphic to the quotient of the path category of its skeleton by the equivalence relation determined by the commuting squares, and show that this extends to a homeomorphism of infinite-path spaces when the k-graph is row finite with no sources. We conclude with a short direct proof of the characterization, originally due to Robertson and Sims, of simplicity of the C*-algebra of a row-finite k-graph with no sources.