During World War II he was called up and was posted as an army officer to the North-West Frontier Province, the Lebanon and post-war Germany.
Desmond arranged co-editions of art books with European publishers (especially French, Swiss and German), such as Skira, Ernst Wasmuth and Fernand Hazan.
[16] Zwemmer insisted that his books' scholarly content was matched by the "highest standards of typography, illustration, printing and binding"[7] and by careful editing, all of which he closely supervised.
In 1985 after Desmond suffered a stroke, both brothers decided to sell the whole business to Philip Wilson, a company which specialised in fine arts,[9] and to retire.
[1] Desmond Zwemmer was a striking figure and had once been described as "six feet-four tall, wearing a widebrimmed black hat and dark overcoat well below the knees" who could have been mistaken for a "descendant of a prosperous Rembrandt merchant".