The Urban Planning Research Lab (UPRL) is the oldest research institution of the School of Architecture of the National Technical University Athens (NTUA). Its founder and first director were Professor Antonis Kriezis (1964 to 1968), followed by the professors Athanasios Aravantinos (1969 to 1994), Georgios Sarigiannis (1994 to 2007), Polyxeni Kosmaki (2007 to 2010), and Dimitris N. Karydis (2011 to 2015). Since 2016, director of the UPRL is Professor Konstantinos Serraos.
In this long course, the UPRL functioned as a pilot research center, which elaborated research projects on behalf of organizations of the wider public sector, with a radiation that soon covered many regions of the country. At a time when research on the interpretation of the production processes of the urban space was very limited, the UPRL introduced new, innovative directions for the spatial management. At the same time, it organized training programs for public officials, and thus it provided scientific knowledge and know-how with an emphasis on intervention directions for the spatial development and the improvement of the urban environment. Already before 1980 a series of such important applied surveys was completed, for Epirus' Thessaly, Peloponnese, Andritsaina, Kalamata, Penteli, etc., as well as the extensive "Survey of Urban Planning Standards".
Currently, the UPRL systematically promotes interdisciplinary cooperation on issues of spatial interest, at national and international level, and is inextricably linked to the support of the educational process at the School of Architecture of NTUA, at undergraduate and postgraduate level, providing new scientific knowledge, documentation data, research material, etc. The main areas of research and scientific activity of the UPRL are the Urban Analysis [among others: recording and evaluating spatial data, monitoring the evolution of urban space, assessing socio-economic and environmental dimensions of the urban environment, etc.], and the Urban Planning and Urban Design procedure [among others: innovative design methodologies, feasibility and expediency of urban interventions, urban regeneration, environmental urban planning, etc.]».