Margaret McKay Tee was born in 1882 and raised in Pennsylvania until her family moved to Colorado. Following her education at Colorado College, she trained at New York's Cooper Union and Columbia Teacher's College, where she met Frank Alvah Parsons. Tee subsequently worked for Parsons as a student instructor when he joined the faculty of the New York School of Fine and Applied Art (later, Parsons The New School for Design). Before her marriage to John Tee in 1913, she apprenticed with Jean Griest, a New York decorator. The Tees returned to Colorado and eventually settled at Brinton Terrace, an artists' colony in Denver. During World War II, Tee and her husband worked at the Ogden Air Service Command base.

In her professional career, Tee was a consulting designer for such notable companies as Bigelow Carpet Persian Rug Company, Cyrus Boutwell, and Emden & Wormser. Tee also committed herself to art and design eductation education, serving as art director and teacher at the Graland Country Day school for fifteen years, and teaching fine art and design at the Denver Academy of Art, Colorado Women's College, and Colorado University, as well as at Denver's Vocational High School.