In 2007, the Royal British Institute of Architects (RIBA) commissioned Jeremy Till’s now seminal essay, ‘Architectural Research: Three Myths and One Model’. Till’s essay called out ‘unnecessary antipathy’ between practitioners and academics, arguing for enhanced collaboration to enable a more ‘dynamic system’ of research. This paper presents a pilot study of five large architectural practices engaged in research that seeks to understand what is driving greater research engagement within contemporary architectural practice, what knowledge is being created for what purpose, and the relationship of practice-generated research to that produced within academia. Five semi-structured interviews and three written questionnaires were elicited from practices, each of whom have dedicated research staff or a demonstrated track record of research engagement and/or utilisation. Ultimately, it is suggested, a more honest discussion of the relational dynamics of collaborations between practice and academia is needed. Such discussion requires researchers from both to embrace ethnographic approaches, reporting not just the outcomes of their work together but also revealing the ‘mess’ involved in generating those outcomes.