Berthe des Clayes was born in Aberdeen, Scotland, and lived in England and Canada. She worked in oil, watercolour and pastel, and produced primarily landscapes in an impressionistic style.

She studied at the Bushey School of Art in England with Hubert von Herkomer, and in Paris at the Académie Julian with Tony Robert-Fleury and Jules Lefebvre. From 1906 to 1912, she lived in London.

Des Clayes immigrated to Montreal in 1912, along with her sister Gertrude who was an artist, and their younger sister Alice, also an artist, joined them two years later. They set up a studio in Beaver Hall Square, a favourite haunt for artists. Berthe lived in Montreal until 1919, participating in the spring exhibitions at the Montreal Museum of Fine Art, and exhibited with the Royal Canadian Academy.

In 1920, des Clayes moved to Chorleywood in England, returning to Montreal in 1931, where she resided until 1951. She returned to England in 1967, and lived in Devon.

Des Clayes won the Jessie Dow Prize twice, awarded by the Art Association of Montreal. She illustrated the books Here and There in Montreal and the Island of Montreal by Charles W. Stokes and Acadia (Nova Scotia) by the Dominion Atlantic Railway. She was an Associate member of the Royal Academy of Arts. Her work is in the collections of the Musée National des beaux-arts du Québec, the National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the University of Calgary, the University of British Columbia and Library and Archives Canada.