So here is a quote from Bethesda about how they are handling armor pieces:
Now for those of you that never played Morrowind, every piece of armor was seperate, for example instead of having greaves, you have a shin guard and a thigh guard. Instead of having a chest piece, you have forarm, bicep, and chest. It's was a great system, especially in the beginning because you really felt like you were scrapping together a set of armor.
So I'll put this out there to the community. Would you rather go back to the separate pieces, or do you like the more consolidated type of armor as described for Skyrim?
Personally I would rather go back to the older way, although it is enticing to have matching armor all the time.