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This article will describe the recent steps in the development of a computationalgenerative system based on the selection and combination of ordinaryarchitectural elements. Built as a Grasshopper definition, the system wasconceived to generate designs of architectural façades and to produce models,physical and digital, for didactic use. More specifically, The paper will addressthe conception of controlling devices, that is, the parts of the computationalsystem that govern design variations. This process involved two complementaryactions: first, the definition of a clear organizational logic, where elements canbe represented as a data structure that encompasses classes, sub-classes, sets,libraries and attributes; secondly, the establishment of means to operate thevariations through the use of filters and heuristics based on visual patterns,allowing varying degrees of automation and user control. It will be argued thatsuch organizational model paves the way to increase the number of designpossibilities in the future and to and provide means to integrate of architecturalcriteria into the generation process. This research has received the support ofCNPq.