'pile on layers' is a correct and usable phrase in written English.
You can use it when you want to suggest that someone or something is adding a large number of components or items to something else. For example, you could say, "We need to pile on layers of security measures to keep our data safe."
But piling on layers doesn't guarantee depth.
Don't hold yourself back when applying your gothic makeup, yet don't pile on layer after layer - you'll find that this may weigh you down and get on your nerves throughout the day.
Others made shelters out of multiple umbrellas or just piled on layers of fabric.
A fluke special consisted of pan-seared fillets piled on layers of spinach and gnocchi.
He also combines like with like, wrapping eel and braised pork belly in a hand roll and then piling on layers of richness with avocado and spicy mayonnaise.
With the producer Dave Fridmann, MGMT have piled on layers and loops of percussion, electronics and effects: an almost overwhelming welter of activity, a meticulous clamor that wells up and changes throughout every track.
To me José Limón's "Moor's Pavane" (1949) is slices of ham masquerading as a courteous roundelay; and Twyla Tharp's "In the Upper Room" (1986) — with its dancers peeling off layers of clothing, its Philip Glass score piling on layers of sound (those terrible heavenly voices!) and the billowing clouds of smoke lighted by Ms. Tipton — is ludicrously manipulative and synthetic.
But the plot, in which a shark-week nature-show cameraman (Chris Sullivan) goes rogue, leading his anxious wife (Rebecca Hart) to track him down, piles on layers of drama that the play doesn't need — you find yourself thinking, Get back to the destruction of the earth!
A patchwork of local, sectoral rules risks piling on layers of regulations that distort incentives, raise costs excessively and prove hard to sweep away if and when a better system eventually emerges.However, as Bali showed, politics has a habit of undermining economics.
