Introducing the BERNINA 990: The Ultimate Quilting Machine

Have you seen the biggest sewing news of the year? BERNINA has released its brand new top-of-the-line machine, the incredible BERNINA 990: The Ultimate Sewing, Embroidery and Quilting Machine!

I’ve shared some of the features that make it the ultimate in sewing and the ultimate in embroidery already. Now, let me finish blowing your mind with my favorite functions of the ultimate quilting machine.

The Ultimate Quilting Machine

BISR

Since its release in 2004, the BERNINA Stitch Regulator has been a beloved BERNINA and it just got even better with the BERNINA Integrated Stitch Regulator (BISR)! That’s right, the BERNINA 990 comes with the stitch regulator integrated into the machine. This allows you to use it with ANY free-motion foot. I think this is just the motivation I needed to go through the Essential Ruler Quilting Challenge, which will now be a cinch with B 990!

Yes, it’s true you can finally do stitch regulated rulerwork with the B 990, a feature so many new B 990 owners are ecstatic to try out. I have been using the BISR with the Free-motion Couching Foot #43 and have had such fun with the stitching created with it! Check out this awesome blog post about Easy Couching Techniques with Q Series to help you get started on the B 990. I can also use my favorite free-motion foot, Adjustable Stippling Foot #73, to free-motion my quilts with stitch regulation.

In the photo below, you can see how the screen automatically offers free-motion feet as an option once the 5.5 mm/BISR Stitch Plate is set in place on the machine. The Presser Foot Selection screen offers information about the foot as well, including a photo of the foot, the foot number, and the maximum stitch width the foot will allow.

Once you’ve installed the 5.5 mm/BISR Stitch Plate on the machine, you’ll be allowed to choose BISR mode from the Main Menu or Home Screen. Select the presser foot you will use for your project, then select the BISR mode you prefer, and start stitching. You will love how smooth the new BISR feels!

Tip: Don’t forget! The B 990 now has automatic stitch plate recognition as well, meaning you won’t have to tell your machine you have on the correct stitch plate- it will already know!

Customizable Quilt Designs

Computerized Quilting, or CQ for short, is when you use the module to custom quilt your projects. You can learn more about CQ via my blog post on WeAllSew all about getting started with Computerized Quilting or The Big Book of Computerized Quilting. The BERNINA 990 has taken CQ to new heights with its customizable quilt designs.

The BERNINA 790 PRO BERNINA introduced a host of fantastic features, all of which we can find on the B 990, as well! Two features really stand out for quilters:

design with automatically morph to fit the area. This is great for placing square quilting designs in diamonds, trapezoids, parallelograms, or kite-shaped blocks!

It’s also fantastic if you, like me, aren’t the most accurate quilt piecer and your square blocks end up a little misshapen. No worries about that quilt design not fitting! 4-Point Placement makes it so you can fit the square block beautifully into your slightly less-than-square block. Pair 4-Point Placement with the new Pinpoint Laser and wow!

The B 990 doesn’t just read BERNINA long arm files (BQM). The B 990 reads six different longarm quilting formats: BQM, HQF, PAT, PLT, QLI and TAP formats. By reading longarm formats, you now have the functionality of professional longarm quilting on your sewing machine. This gives you unlimited resizing, the ability to modify stitches per inch (SPI), and options to customize how the designs stitch out (more on that in the next section).

The B 990 has 206 built-in quilting designs, but don’t worry! You can use a USB stick to use any quilting designs you own to make your quilt perfect. Use these amazing quilting designs with the BISR, walking foot, rulers, and more to create gorgeous custom quilting results on all your projects.

The Giant Hoop is a key factor for getting your computerized quilting projects done quickly! With a stitch area of 16.1” by 12” and a twist lock closure, this incredible hoop allows you to embroider or quilt a full 12”x12” square with ease.

Start/Stop Features

These new start/stop features, found in the Position submenu, are so fantastic they needed their own section. The BERNINA 990 introduces three new outstanding features to BERNINA sewing and embroidery machines and they are:

• Show Start/Stop
• Flip Start/Stop
• Match Start/Stop

Show Start/Stop

When Show Start/Stop is selected, the yellow line will appear above the icon and you will see a green plus (+) icon, indicating the starting stitch mark, and a red plus (+) icon to show where stitching ends. This helps us visualize the flow of designs across a quilt or we can use it in conjunction with the next two features to truly customize our quilt designs.

This feature also works for standard embroidery designs and will remain on, even after turning off the machine, until you toggle it off.

Flip Start/Stop

We also have the option to Flip Start/Stop. This feature allows you to customize designs by choosing which end the stitching will start or stop. It only works with customizable quilt designs. In the image below, you can see this allowed me to flip the stitching direction of the circular motif. There are many reasons to change where a quilt design starts, such as decreasing stitch time for an optimized stitchout flow or to create a new quilt design by matching the points, like we are going to do next.

Match Start/Stop

By simply tapping the Match Start/Stop icon, we have perfectly matched the two quilt designs and made our own new design! So exciting! This feature works by moving the last stitch (stop) in the bottom-most layer of the Layer Bar to align with the first stitch (start) of the top-most layer. If you have three or more layers selected, they will continue to match all the designs in this manner. From here, you can select the Group icon to connect these designs together and edit them as one motif.

This feature can be used with any type of embroidery design, including sewing stitches, and is also really useful when using the Shape Designer feature if you’d like the designs to touch.

Tip: Before stitching, select Reduce Thread Changes in the Color options on the Stitchout Summary to have your designs stitch continuously without stopping.

I can’t wait to remake a Computerized Quilting Velvet Pillow again with these features!

If you’re curious to hear about even more features on the B 990 or learn more about what all comes with the machine, then stop into your local BERNINA dealer to see what else makes the BERNINA 990 the Ultimate Machine.

I even have some suggestions for you to ask your dealer about:

• Undo/Redo in Sewing
• Stitch Designer
• The new Color Wheel in embroidery
• Stitchout Summary
• Shape Designer
• And so much more!

And, of course, you have to see the machine in person to truly appreciate all the features I detailed here … the 14” throat space, 10.1” color touch screen, 90 LED lights in the freearm area … just to name a few. You won’t even believe how quiet it is. I can’t wait for you to try it out!

I’d love to know what you have planned as your first B 990 project! Tell us in the comments which feature you are most excited about trying out for yourself.