From Hartnell’s description, it sounds like it was a three or four piece costume:

You have the bib or tunic, shoulder flaps, and the hood itself which had a square top which seemed to be deliberately made. So this isn’t just a burlap sack that someone cut holes in. This was carefully planned and creatively made. Designed, cut, stitched together, and then the symbol made and stitched on perfectly.

Yes, he probably belonged to some crazy religious cult like the Process Church and later broke off from this group to form his own crazy cult. The Manson Family also wore very similar regalia!

What was put in my car in Napa was in "two" parts, the hood which was a painted paper sack with large cutouts for the eyes ( Not slits!) I don’t remember if the nose and mouth were cut out or not? The bib which was about one and a half yards long,36 inches wide black "inexpensive cotton". When opened flat on a table, the part that went over his head was a circle cut and a slit about 8 or 10 inches down the backside, to go over his head. there would be no need to have more pieces.

The flaps were part of the paper sack. they were cut on all four sides about 3 inches up and bent to rest on his shoulders, probably sitting under the bib? It would have been easier if it sat on top of the bib for his head to be able to turn without restriction. The clip-on sunglasses held it tightly to his face so when he turned his head the hood turned as well. I believe the man who wore it is the man who followed me in Vallejo/ Napa in 1968. I got a very good close up look at his face before he contorted it. He is the same man I took a picture of on Aug. 10th, 1990. He has the same scars that Kathleen Johns said her abductor had. She gave the best description of who more than likely Zodiac was/ is than anyone else! He would be about 80 years old now.

One more thing to add to the costume. Bryan said he was able to see the killer’s jacket collar! The investigator who wrote one of the reports about the costume assumed it was a one-piece costume, he ignored the statement of Bryan saying he could see the collar of the jacket, which would be impossible to see if it were one solid piece!

This is why when I mentioned the costume to Paul Holes when he phoned me about two yrs ago, he said that he would test it for DNA only if it fit the description Bryan gave!
If investigators only read the one description that makes it one solid piece, it wouldn’t do me any good to get the costume back, because it is not a match to that one report!

I wish Bryan Hartnell would look at the copy I made and make it clear that the costume was in two parts. Perhaps he didn’t think it was that important to clear up?

This is why when I mentioned the costume to Paul Holes when he phoned me about two yrs ago, he said that he would test it for DNA only if it fit the description Bryan gave!
If investigators only read the one description that makes it one solid piece, it wouldn’t do me any good to get the costume back, because it is not a match to that one report!

I wish Bryan Hartnell would look at the copy I made and make it clear that the costume was in two parts. Perhaps he didn’t think it was that important to clear up?

It’s all moot if it can’t be produced.

The square hood.
My spouse is an excellent seamstress, totally uninterested in the Zodiac case, and these are her observations about the Hood:
+ Square-shape hood is much easier to construct than a human-fitted hood. The latter requires at least intermediate knowledge of garment pattern design, requires finesse, and takes more time.
+ A good seamstress would have found a way to integrate the glasses snugly to the hood itself (no clip-on device).
+ Z Probably used a sewing machine for most of it. The choice of the simplest square design argues also for ease of construction. Hand-stitching is very time consuming and always avoided as a practical matter. Unless it is a labour of love?
+ Not once has my spouse seen a garment pattern for a square-shaped hood in any publication.

Given that, can we infer anything about Z?

The square hood.
My spouse is an excellent seamstress, totally uninterested in the Zodiac case, and these are her observations about the Hood:
+ Square-shape hood is much easier to construct than a human-fitted hood. The latter requires at least intermediate knowledge of garment pattern design, requires finesse, and takes more time.
+ A good seamstress would have found a way to integrate the glasses snugly to the hood itself (no clip-on device).
+ Z Probably used a sewing machine for most of it. The choice of the simplest square design argues also for ease of construction. Hand-stitching is very time consuming and always avoided as a practical matter. Unless it is a labour of love?
+ Not once has my spouse seen a garment pattern for a square-shaped hood in any publication.

Given that, can we infer anything about Z?

What does your spouse say about the Zodiac symbol on the front? Hartnell said it was stitched on with great care.

Yes a bag-like hood is easier to make, you can infer how to make one from looking at a paper bag or even a cardboard box.

That being said, talk about going overboard, why even make one. I wonder if it might not have actually been reused, something he was handed and he repurposed it. Like, people in some late 60s satanic cult having hoods given to them and he may have been a member for some time. He just added his symbol on it.
Darlene’s sister said her sister told her the guy who was stalking her was probably worried she was going to reveal she had seen him murder someone. In what context could she have seen that unless she was part of what happened and was afraid to reveal it without being guilty herself? Maybe some satanic cult. It was the “in” thing back then.

I guess another possibility is she was hanging out with a cop and maybe he killed someone while offduty while she was with him.

If instead it was in San Francisco that she was a murder then who knows, could have been a gang fight or something like that. Maybe that could have been the case in Vallejo too.

What does your spouse say about the Zodiac symbol on the front? Hartnell said it was stitched on with great care.

+ Okay I asked: hand-stitched she also reports. On a one-of-a-kind you would just do the hand work and not bother trying to develop a machine method. It could be machined if you wanted to mass-produce it, but probably not with a simple home sewing machine. On a home machine it would be more trouble than it was worth. Z lovingly hand-stitched his logo on.

On a home machine it would be more trouble than it was worth. Z lovingly hand-stitched his logo on.

With the same precise effort that he put ciphers together. This was not an out of control killer.

The offender gives the impression as having the desire for the Hood and then teaching himself how to create it, rather than previously being skilled in sewing and such.

What does your spouse say about the Zodiac symbol on the front? Hartnell said it was stitched on with great care.

+ Okay I asked: hand-stitched she also reports. On a one-of-a-kind you would just do the hand work and not bother trying to develop a machine method. It could be machined if you wanted to mass-produce it, but probably not with a simple home sewing machine. On a home machine it would be more trouble than it was worth. Z lovingly hand-stitched his logo on.

Thanks for this response. Really fascinating.

What would be the process for this? Would you trace it out first and then stitch inside the outline? How long would handstitching a 4" by 4" Zodiac symbol take?

Too bad Hartnell didn’t discuss the costume, asking him how it was made.

Hatnell was under duress. How much did he know about sewing? His statement that it was stitched on could simply be a guess. It was very possibly painted on using fabric paint or whiteout.

Too bad Hartnell didn’t discuss the costume, asking him how it was made.

Hatnell was under duress. How much did he know about sewing? His statement that it was stitched on could simply be a guess. It was very possibly painted on using fabric paint or whiteout.

That’s not at all what the police reports say. Nor is it what he says in he 2007 documentary.

We could effectively take every eyewitness statement and apply the same argument of the guessing game. What we know of Hartnell is that he was a very astute and intelligent individual who recalled the evening’s events with great clarity under extremely difficult circumstances. If we can’t take his observations as likely accurate, we cannot take any of the other eyewitnesses as accurate. In this scenario, we can literally rewrite the Zodiac story with an endless array of alternative hypotheses. Is it possible that Hartnell was wrong – yes. But this applies to the three teenagers, Armond Pelissetti, Donald Fouke, James Owen, Stella Medeiros, William Crow, Helen Axe, Nancy Slover and just about every other eyewitness and earwitness in the Zodiac case. Bryan Hartnell interacted with the Zodiac for the longest period of any of the eyewitnesses in the case. If we cannot use this as a basis that he was likely correct, then we cannot use any of the other eyewitness recollections as reliable. This leaves us deconstructing the case rather than advancing it. Assessing the observational awareness of Hartnell, in accompaniment to the time he interacted with the Zodiac Killer, should lean us towards what he said as likely accurate. If his observations were inacaccurate, then a case can be made to reject or disbelieve every other eyewitness that crossed paths with the killer. In this scenario, we are left with very little.

We could effectively take every eyewitness statement and apply the same argument of the guessing game. What we know of Hartnell is that he was a very astute and intelligent individual who recalled the evening’s events with great clarity under extremely difficult circumstances. If we can’t take his observations as likely accurate, we cannot take any of the other eyewitnesses as accurate. In this scenario, we can literally rewrite the Zodiac story with an endless array of alternative hypotheses. Is it possible that Hartnell was wrong – yes. But this applies to the three teenagers, Armond Pelissetti, Donald Fouke, James Owen, Stella Medeiros, William Crow, Helen Axe, Nancy Slover and just about every other eyewitness and earwitness in the Zodiac case. Bryan Hartnell interacted with the Zodiac for the longest period of any of the eyewitnesses in the case. If we cannot use this as a basis that he was likely correct, then we cannot use any of the other eyewitness recollections as reliable. This leaves us deconstructing the case rather than advancing it. Assessing the observational awareness of Hartnell, in accompaniment to the time he interacted with the Zodiac Killer, should lean us towards what he said as likely accurate. If his observations were inacaccurate, then a case can be made to reject or disbelieve every other eyewitness that crossed paths with the killer. In this scenario, we are left with very little.

Well said.