Symmetrically and dissymmetrically disubstituted imidazole-4,5-dicarboxamides (I45DCs) have diverse bioactivities and therefore represent useful small molecules for lead structure identification in drug discovery. For this reason, an improved synthesis was developed as a first step in the preparation of greater numbers of analogues. The method involves the transformation of imidazole-4,5-dicarboxylic acid into dissymmetrically disubstituted I45DCs in four steps and in a minimum yield of 51%. This reflects an overall reduction of one synthetic step and a greater than 30% improvement in yield over the known method.