use a texture pattern with displacement map? or work this in plane like a brick wall and shrink wrap along a cilynder? i try to imagine how to work it...
After that you could break parts off and work seperately, or just go ahead and work on it all at the same time. Boolean the holes in the centre to finish.
@sixbysix go a bit above and few pages back, I and wirex shared the workflow to this that work on curves so your surface is flat and should work for this too.
For this I would recommend working from a higher poly sphere. SubD is not gonna work with your current mesh. All the unevenly distributed edges are breaking curvature.