Okay, chain-mail enthusiasts, whip out your jump rings and pliers and tackle this project, Japanese Cascade Earrings with Pearls, from page 28 of Chain Mail Jewelry by Terry Taylor and Dylon Whyte [1]. These lovely cascading earrings were designed by Anne Kelly. (COPYRIGHT: I'm so sorry to have to put this here, but I've had trouble with online content theft. Readers are welcome to print my articles for their personal use, but I do not allow my text or photos to be copied to anyone's online site. No one may use my content without written permission from me.)
Note: The directions that follow show you how I put together one earring. Repeat the whole thing for your second earring. Here, due to article-length constraints, I drastically summarize the source material, which runs to 27 steps on 4 pages in the book. The book also includes step-by-step line drawings which are much easier to follow than photos. So, if you like every step detailed in the text, rest assured that the book does do that.
Here is my result as shown in the Photo 1. Note: I used post-and-ball earring findings that were too small because that's all I had on hand. You can see it looks a little weird. Definitely try to find the 6mm size specified in the materials list.
Time of project: Believe it or not, it took me 4.5 hours to do one earring, but I think most can probably do it faster than I did.
Materials:
- 36 large sterling silver jump rings. You choose the size. The book recommends 19 gauge (0.9119 mm), 3.97 mm inner-diameter. I used standard 9 mm jump rings.
- 128 small sterling silver jump rings. You choose the size. The book recommends 21 gauge (0.7239 mm), 2.38 mm inner-diameter. I used standard 7mm jump rings.
- 8 fully drilled freshwater pearls, 5.5 mm
- 2 fully drilled freshwater pearls, 6.5 mm
- 10 sterling silver headpins
- 6mm sterling silver post-and-ball earring findings plus backings
- Chain-nose pliers
- Round-nose pliers
- Wire snips
Step 1: Prepare the jump rings. Make sure all 36 of the large jump rings are closed, and open all 128 of your small jump rings.
(See my Chain Mail Basics article on how to open and close jump rings.)
Getting everything prepared in this first step will speed your assembly later on. You're going to assemble a basic diamond-shape for each earring as shown in the Photo 2, and then attach beads on headpins to it, if you wish.
Look at the basic diamond pattern in Photo 2.
Then see Photo 2a where I break it into three parts: the upper triangle circled in red, the row-of-three circled in blue which forms the widest point of the diamond, and the bottom triangle circled in green.
Step 2: The assembly technique. See Photo 3. Place one large jump ring directly on top of another to form a pair. You'll work in doubles like this all through the project. Do this a second time to form a second pair of large jump rings. Connect the pairs with two small jump rings, each of which you close with your pliers. 
Step 3: The upper triangle. See Photo 4. As specified in the assembly technique in step 2, you'll use two small jump rings to connect each pair of large jump rings to the next pair of large jump rings. When you're done, you'll have three pairs of large jump rings attached to one another to form a triangle, which is held together by three pairs of small jump rings in the center. The pair of large jump rings at the top of the triangle is your apex. That's where you will connect your post-and-ball to complete the earring. I found it helpful to put a twist-tie on the apex so I could hang the project on my bulletin board to check its drape as I assembled it.
Step 4: The row-of-three. See Photos 5 and 6. This row of three pairs of large jump rings forms the widest point in the diamond. The upper triangle sits on top of it, and the bottom triangle will taper down below it. Use the assembly technique detailed back in step 2 to connect each pair of large jump rings to the next pair of large jump rings with two small jump rings. In Photo 5, I'm midway through this step. I've hung the three pairs of large jump rings in place that form the row-of-three underneath the upper triangle.
Look at Photo 5. In the row-of-three, the leftmost pair of large jump rings is connected to the left half of the base of the upper triangle with one set of small jump rings. The middle pair of large jump rings in the row-of-three is connected to the upper triangle via two sets of small jump rings (one set connecting it to the left half of the triangle base, and one set connecting it to the right half of the triangle base), and the rightmost pair of large jump rings, which I've stretched out a bit in the photo, is connected to the right half of the base of the upper triangle via one set of small jump rings.Photo 6 shows the three pairs of large jump rings that form the row-of-three. Here, they are fully attached to the upper triangle and to one another in a horizontal line across the row. So, as shown in the photo, the leftmost pair takes two small jump rings, the middle pair takes four small jump rings, and the rightmost pair takes two small jump rings.
Step 5: The bottom triangle. See Photos 7 and 8. Using the same assembly technique shown in step 2, you will build the bottom triangle, starting with its base (two pairs of large jump rings side-by-side as shown) which you'll connect to the row-of-three, and finish with a single pair of large jump rings for its downward-facing point.In Photo 7, I've added the two pairs of large jump rings that form the base of the downward-pointing bottom triangle. I've used two small jump rings for each connection to attach the base of the bottom triangle to the row-of-three. I've also used two small jump rings to attach the two pairs of large jump rings that make the base of the downward-facing triangle to each other.
If this gets hard to visualize, have a look back at Photo 2a where I've circled the three parts of the basic diamond in different colors. That should help. Also, you can hang the project up by its apex on a bulletin board and see how it drapes.In Photo 8, I have partially attached the last pair of large jump rings, which forms the endpoint of the bottom triangle. Two small jump rings connect it to the left pair of large jump rings in the base of the triangle. I have one small jump ring twisted open and hanging off the right pair of large jump rings in the base of the triangle.
From here, you'll want to move that last hanging pair of large jump rings into position under the base of the triangle and connect it by closing the small jump ring (plus adding and closing a second small jump ring alongside that first one).
Once you've finished that, my friends, you have the basic diamond shape earring as shown in Photo 2. If you've already hit your limit with chain-mail jewelry, you can skip to step 9 and attach the ball-and-post finding to the apex and call it a day. This will give you an earring that on page 32 the project designer calls Five Row Japanese Earrings [2].
Step 6: Make the wrapped pearl-bead loops. See Photo 9. Take four of your small size pearl beads and one of your large size pearl beads. Put these five beads on headpins and wrap those headpins into loops. Make sure to make those loops bigger than you normally would – big enough to accommodate two small jump rings side-by-side. 
To wrap, string the bead on the headpin and push it to the end. Use your chain-nose pliers in your less-dominant hand to grab the wire above the bead. Use your round-nose pliers in your dominant hand to bend the wire around your chain-nose pliers into a fairly big loop. Continue to wrap the excess wire three times around the stem of the headpin between your loop and the bead to close the loop. Trim off excess with wire snips.Step 7. Add the small jump rings to make dangles. See Photo 10. Attach two small jump rings to the loop and close them. Repeat with two more small jump rings attached to the first pair, and repeat that until you have the dangles as shown in Photo 10 with three sets of small jump rings forming an extension that ends in a pearl bead.
Step 8. Attach the pearl-bead dangles to the basic diamond earring. See Photo 11 where I've pinned up the earring by its widest point, the row-of-three. Photo 11 shows the end result. In Photo 11a I've circled in different colors where you need to connect each dangle. Use two small jump rings to attach each dangle to the specified pair of large jump rings in the basic diamond as follows. Attach your dangle with the one large pearl bead to the pair of large jump rings that forms the endpoint in the downward-facing triangle. In Photo 11a, I've circled that connection point in green.
Left of that and one level up, attach a dangle to the left pair of large jump rings that forms half of the base of the downward facing triangle. I've circled that connection point in blue. Left of that and one level up, attach a dangle to the leftmost pair of large jump rings in the row-of-three. I've circled that connection point in red.
Do the exact same thing as shown in Photo 11a with your last two dangles on the right side of the earring.
Step 9. Attach your ball-and-post finding. See Photo 12. Use two
small jump rings to connect one small jump ring to the pair of large jump rings on the basic diamond that is your apex. This single small jump ring is now your new apex in the earring. Use another single small jump ring to attach this new apex to the tiny closed ring on your ball-and-post finding.And you're done with your first earring. Yay! Repeat all the steps for your second earring.
References:
[1] Chain Mail Jewelry, Contemporary Designs from Classic Techniques, by Terry Taylor and Dylon Whyte, ISBN 1579907237, published by Lark Books, a division of Sterling Publishing Co. Inc., 2006. Pages 28-32. This book is available at Amazon.com here: Chain Mail Jewelry: Contemporary Designs from Classic Techniques
[2] ibid, page 31.
