Born in London Douglas Lee had started his ballet training at the Arts Educational School London and then received a scholarship for the Royal Ballet School where he graduated in 1996, winning the Alicia Markova Award.
Douglas Lee then joined The Stuttgart Ballet, his promotion to principal dancer followed in 2002. As a principle dancer Douglas Lee danced many prominent roles from choreographers such as John Cranko, Jiri Kylian, John Neumeier, Hans Van Manen, Glen Tetley, George Balanchine and William Forsythe.
Douglas made his choreographic debut in February 1999 for the Stuttgart based Noverre Society’s “Young Choreographers”, after which he was commissioned to create new works for the Stuttgart Ballet which included „Viewing Room“, „Dummy Run“ and „Leviathan“. Following his choreographic success in Stuttgart he became a freelance choreographer working internationally.He also participated twice at the New York Choreographic Institute to work with dancers of The New York City Ballet.
His creation Fanfare LX for the Stuttgart Ballet was taken into the repertoire of the Staatsballett Berlin.He created Fractured Wake and returned to create 5 for Silver for the Norwegian National Ballet, Rubicon Play for the Royal Ballet of Flanders and Lifecasting set to the music of Steve Reich for the New York City Ballet which was shortlisted in Time Out NY as one of the outstanding dance works of 2009 and subsequently taken into the Stuttgart Ballet repertoire.
As well as returning to the Stuttgart Ballet to create Aria and Arcadia he has worked with Tulsa Ballet, Ballett Augsburg, Ballett Dortmund, Ballett Mainz, Ballet du Rhin and the Greek National Ballet. His 2016 creation Snow Was Falling for Perm Opera Ballet Theatre received the prestigious Golden Mask Award for best choreographer. He also created Legion for Netherlands Dance Theatre 2, Playground for Atlanta Ballet as well as three new works for Ballett Zurich. Recent creations include Earthlings for Les Grands Ballett Canadiens de Montreal a new Petrushka with the music of Igor Stravinsky for Ballett Nürnburg and the critically acclaimed Naiad for the Stuttgart Ballet.