Abstract. Architectural research in urban planning. Formation of new ideas in urban planning involves specific modeling of future that will never be realized directly. However, these ideas organized in a particular way render certain discourse which direction urban environment can be developed. This work attempts to investigate specific concepts and study methods within the urban planning according to which the aims and logical architectural research stages are developed. Concepts of the architectural research may be found in various theoretical and practical examples connected to urban planning, design and research methodologies. Based upon recent researches it is argued that the architectural research is derived from two basic components – empirical research method and visual modeling of new architectural solutions that are not based on empirical conclusions. Differences between two components require to describe specifically the concepts that influence architectural research – possibility of the future architecture, visual modeling as an important evidence of possibility and context analysis. These unique notions position the architectural research as a specific type of scientific investigation within the field of research methods.