Several architectural patterns are described in books, papers and in repositories. Due to the huge amount of information related to patterns description and their application, it is important to have approaches and tools available to help developers carry on the selec tion of the patterns more suited to each software project. The reasoning behind architect ural decisions, regarding pattern se lection, usually exists in the form of tacit knowledge. It is important to make th is knowledge explicit by mapping the patterns and the domains where they are most often used. This work proposes a knowledge-based approach to accomplish the architectural patterns selection, according to each project. The approach aims at supporting the construction and maintenance of a knowledge-base to gui de the selection. We bui lt an initial base as a suggestion, relying on recommendations of specialists found in the lite rature. Each team or institution can build its own base or enhance an existing one through the structure offered by the approach. The input for pattern selection consists , basically, of information availa ble in systems requirements. The proposal presented is one step towards the automa tion of architectural pattern selection during on architectural design.