After graduating from Northwestern University in June 1948, she worked for Marshall Fields in Chicago in fashion merchandising.
[3] In 1950, she moved to New York City and soon after, her friend fashion editor Nonnie Moore suggested Peterson join the staff of Mademoiselle.
Of her meeting with Mlle Chanel in 1958, Peterson wrote: At 75 years of age she is still a stunning woman whose swift instincts about fashion never have been dimmed or repressed.
Instead of using the paper's news photographers, she introduced a wave of top-notch fashion photographers and artists to The New York Times including Diane Arbus, George Barkentin, Cecil Beaton, Guy Bourdin, Gleb Derujinsky, Louis Faurer Hiro (photographer) (Yasuhiro Wakabayashi), Saul Leiter, Duane Michals, James Moore, Tom Palumbo, her husband Gösta Peterson, Francesco Scavullo, Bill Silano, and Melvin Sokolsky.
[9][10] Marylin Bender wrote, "Patricia Peterson loved fashion but formed no entangling alliances within the industry.
Pat replied, "I told her I wasn't here to work as a consumer service, but to show what's happening in fashion, to report news.
The [New York] Times pics were rather lousy and there was a bit of trouble, Pat said it was because the cover photo was of a black girl and a white boy about 4 years old, holding hands.
and as for the miscegenation, junior style, it may end up being regarded as a major civil rights breakthrough, if they finally let it pass.
During her tenure, Peterson invited guest artists, such as Edward Gorey and Candy Pratts, to create Bendel's famous window displays.
[26] She and her husband, Gösta Peterson, created a weekly ad campaign for Bendel's that ran as a half-page in The New York Times each Sunday.
[27] Of her partnership with her husband on the Bendel's ad campaign, she said, “Gus is very easy to work with, and our roles are clearly defined.