Wendy Gardiner reviews the Brother Innov-is 1800QC

Let's start by saying I love the Innov-is 1800QC! I have had it now for a few months and it just keeps on giving. I’ve made all sorts of very varied things – from many craft projects for the two books I am writing, to garments for the shows I attend, to samples for display at trade shows. It has coped beautifully with everything I have thrown at it! But back to the beginning.

Out of the box

It might be aimed at quilters (hence the QC and the range of fab quilting accessories) but as a dressmaker and general sewist, I love all the extras too! The machine comes with a whole host of attachments and feet including a large extension table – perfect when sewing big projects such as quilts or coats (as I did) – and a flat bed attachment that holds the tray of feet well thanks to its nicely wide design. The handy lift-out tray has numbered positions for the utility feet, making it easy to identify them and use the recommended foot for the stitch selected. There are also spare bobbins of course, a screw driver and plenty of other extra bits – in fact all the tools we’ve come to expect from a good quality machine.

Many feet make light work

One of the biggest benefits of the 1800QC is that it has upwards of 16 feet – some of which I have yet to use, but will some day! To have a machine that comes with a walking foot, free motion foot, seam guide foot, Teflon foot, quarter inch and adjustable zip foot (perfect for piping too), as well as all the basic utility stitch feet, is absolutely wonderful.

I particularly like the open-toe satin stitch and appliqué feet too – a boon when sewing decorative stitches as you can really see what you are doing and keep on track. As mentioned above, the seven basic utility feet are housed in a neat tray that sits in the flat bed of the machine, under which there is room for the tool kit and the other feet, plus the walking foot. This comes with the quilters guide too; a much under-used gadget that I love for keeping parallel lines of quilting or decorative stitching perfectly straight, easily!

Stitch choice

There are literally hundreds of stitches to choose from! I have not even begun to use all the options, even though I do a lot of decorative stitching on various projects. What's more, with the Innovis 1800 I can mix stitches to create my own stitch pattern, saving them to the machine's memory – but more of that in a future blog!



Stitch selection is easy – with four menus plus alphabet on offer and illustrations of each stitch in the flap lid that covers the thread path. To choose, select the menu from the four available, pick the stitch by pressing the numerical buttons and there it is – with which foot to use noted in the LCD window, plus a note of the automatically selected stitch width and length (which of course can be altered if you want).

Plenty of power

I have successfully stitched through several layers of denim when customising a jacket (not only 4-6 layers of denim, but added lace and bias binding too – all stitched together with a decorative stitch!).

I’ve also made a coat from a thick woollen fabric with couched yarns all over it – again bulky but not a problem for this beast – and I’ve made a fine silk blouse which, again, was no problem! Just use the appropriate needle to suit the fabric and you are ready to go.

The stitch speed means you can control how fast or slow you work – a boon when free motion stitching as you can select mid-speed and then with foot pressed hard on the pedal, move the fabric smoothly to create your own free motion quilting.

You can also decide whether you want to finish stitching with the needle down or up, down being a much better choice for during appliqué and needing when you need to stop with needle down before pivoting fabric. A super-easy needle threader makes that simple little task quicker and easier too, and best of all the auto thread cutter (scissors icon on the machine) means the threads are taken to the reverse of the work and then cut – no more feeding thread tails to the back and tying them off.

Coat of many colours

In my next few blogs I will share details of some of the things I have made on this lovely machine, such as the furry blanket with cotton backing above. There was no problem feeding such different fabrics and thick layers evenly with the walking foot using the stretchy, jersey knit fabric. I’ve also made a coat with fabric that had been in my stash for many years, but that my new Brother happily worked into a beautiful garment!

See you next time!