Contemporary architectural practice is expanding its horizon of work and research on city and landscape with all their complexities, from social to ecological. Active presence of theory in the process of design, necessarily led to development of design methodology known as architectural design research. Contemporary architects, searching for the truth as the pre-condition for architectural creation, are experimenting with presented architectural and non-architectural attributes. Their goal is to create something new, something unrecognized as architectural form so far, but now is. The paper discusses two methodological design platform - design by research and study by design. The research aims to review the possible directions for addressing the problems of design, through something that is determined by something that already exists, and the study involves an empirical verification of design results, which subject is determined by current context with addition of something new, and this new is variable because it needs to be designed. The paper considers the results of design research related to environmental sustainability and energy efficiency, applied through the bidding practice of the group Architectural Alchemy (AA). The result of this consideration is reflected in the conclusion that Study by Design, is mostly exploring new opportunities with a generic variable, and new knowledge and understanding of the design, which is of undoubted importance to meet the complex requirements such as adaptation to climate change.
