Hello! 
I’m new to blender, in fact I’m even new to CG and actually trying to learn modelling. After having done some basic tutorials I have started to model a strange fantasy instrument called “gastophon” that I got to know from a French comic, I use some images I found as a reference.
This gastophon has a part that’s similar to a drum which is covered with some leather-like thing. Because I’m a bit lazy, I tried to do this part with a soft body that has the size of the leather and falls like cloth over the deflecting part of the model, producing some nice, realistic looking wrinkles. The result I achieved looks actually similar to the comic, but now I’ve got the problem that I can not fix the actual state of deformation of the leather mesh. Baking the soft body simulation didn’t help, if I switch to edit mode the mesh is undeformed as before.
What can I do to make the state of deformation static and the deformed mesh directly manipulatable in edit mode?
Thank you in advance for your answers.
You are most of the way there. After baking the softbody, go to the frame where your mesh is shaped the way you want. In the Modifiers panel (F9 -> Modifiers) will be a Softbody modifier. Click the Apply button in that modifier, and your softbodied mesh will become editable.
THAT’s what I needed, Great Thanks!