After studying film direction at the RITS in Brussels, he worked as a dramaturge with Ivo Van Hove's first companies: Akt and Akt-Vertikaal. From the late 1980s to 2005 he worked as a theatre director for Kaaitheater, Het Zuidelijk Toneel, Toneelgroep Amsterdam, De Tijd and Walpurgis. He directs contemporary repertoire and also self-written texts: Het Kind van de Smid (together with Josse De Pauw), Sittings and Trinity trip. As a screenwriter, he also contributes to various television films and two feature films by Dorothée van den Berghe: Meisje and My Queen Karo. Together with Josse De Pauw he writes and directs the feature film Vinaya. Since 2007 he has been working as a dramaturge with Toneelgroep Amsterdam (now ITA) for Ivo Van Hove, as well as various guest directors: Simon Stone, Katie Mitchell, Julien Gosselin, Simon McBurney and Luk Perceval (In Ongenade after J.M. Coetzee and Het Jaar van de Kreeft after Hugo Claus). In 2014 his first novel Wat Rest will be published by the Bezige Bij. For the Muntschouwburg he writes the libretto for an opera by Kris Defoort based on The Time of our Singing by Richard Powers. Peter van Kraaij lives and works in Amsterdam.

- update May 2019