so my boyfriend and i are making our second set of leather armor. we are not in the SCA ,so we are not following any rules, just trying to make something visually appealing. he also likes to make sure his is functional- because you never know when i might lose it and start hacking at him with my axe.
we are making me a leather bustier type thing and in order to avoid pointy boob sections (if we make a cone for each one) we are using a few curved sections and stitching them together. i really dont want some massive cones sticking out in front of me, poking people in the back. he, of course, wanted to put spikes right where the points would be. in any case, the body of the piece is composed to 3 separate pieces- the front (with attached boobs), and 2 back pieces that lace up in the center and also connect to the front.

anyways, due to some medication changes, i'm probably going to lose a little weight before i actually am going to wear the armor. we're already going to have to make it shorter, as when we wet it and i put it on, it stretched quite a bit and was super comfortable, instead of being a squish-oh god i cant breathe type of thing that i am used to.
my question is, should i bake it? we molded it, but it is not hard.. i am unsure about if i want it hard or not. if i am wearing it next to my skin and i'm sweating like crazy, will it suddenly lose it's shape and leave me hanging, so to speak?

thanks for your help
Cassandra