N. Gu, S. Watanabe, H. Erhan, M. Hank Haeusler, W. Huang, R. Sosa (eds.), Rethinking Comprehensive Design: Speculative Counterculture, Proceedings of the 19th International Conference on Computer- Aided Architectural Design Research in Asia CAADRIA 2014, 937–938. © 2014, The Association for Computer-Aided Architectural Design Research in Asia (CAADRIA), Hong Kong COMPUTING THE ANATOMY OF TEHRAN Rule based modelling for growing structures DJORDJE STOJANOVIC 1 and MILUTIN CEROVIC 2 1 University of Belgrade, Serbia ds@4ofseven.com, 2 University of Belgrade, Serbia mc@4ofseven.com, 1. Tehran - the testing ground Tehran, Iran’s capital is one of the world’s fast-growing cities. Over the pe- riod of last fifty years, the number of its residents records a twentyfold in- crease. The consequences are visible in the continually changing anatomy of the city. The problem in Tehran is that the processes of urban growth are dif- ficult to control and take their toll on the environment through air and water pollution, accompanied with the loss of arable land and public realm. The question raised is what role architecture can play in remedying current situa- tion in the city, and how to help steer change of the built environment which is fuelled with the myriad of economic, cultural, social and other influences. This paper explores ways to research, understand and control simultaneous and interconnected processes of urban growth which are escaping traditional planning methodology and often developing their own mechanisms of self- regulation (Kauffman, 1993). The study identifies seven key aspects of the changing city-landscape: traffic, pollution, waste management, water supply, demography, public space and built density. The research is based on the limited data available on the internet and information gathered through in situ observation. 2. Experiment Initially, a series of schematic drawings were generated to capture causal and mutually causal relationships between the observed phenomena. Secondly, a