a multiplicative cascade is a randomization of any measure on the unit interval, constructed from an iid collection of random variables indexed by the dyadic intervals. given an arbitrary initial measure i will describe a method for constructing a continuous time, measure valued process whose value at each time is a cascade of the initial one. the process also has the markov property, namely at any given time it is a cascade of the process at any earlier time. it has the further advantage of being a martingale and, under certain extra conditions, it is also continuous. i will discuss applications of this process to models of tree polymers and one dimensional random geometry. joint work with ben rifkind (university of toronto).