Among the leading illustrators commissioned by Cresset were Blair Hughes-Stanton and Gertrude Hermes — The Pilgrim's Progress (1928), The Apocrypha (1929), and D. H. Lawrence's Birds, Beasts and Flowers (1930).
Operating from offices at 11 Fitzroy Square, the Cresset Press was founded in 1927 by Dennis Cohen (1891–1970), whose obituary in The Times details some of the company's first titles: Bacon’s Essays, in folio, printed at the Shakespeare Head, was followed by a number of handsome éditions de luxe, of which the best known today is Gulliver’s Travels decorated by Rex Whistler.
An early member of the Double Crown Club, he paid scrupulous attention to the matching of fine hand-press-work with enterprising illustrations, commissioned a number of the best wood-engravers of the day for editions of The Apocrypha or The Pilgrim’s Progress or, on a smaller scale, the elegant four-volume Herrick printed in Oxford’s Fell type, with decorations by Albert Rutherston.
With John Howard[3][4] as literary adviser the list always contained a strong component of belles lettres (the Cresset Library was a uniquely imaginative series of punctiliously edited reprints), and with James Shand of Shenval Press in charge of production Dennis Cohen’s feeling for the look of his books found a continuing if less luxurious expression.
The Cresset Press published the British editions of all her novels and when, in 1951, McCullers spent three months in England, Cohen gave a large reception in her honour that was attended by the leading literati of the day.