Noel Carrington was educated at Bedford School and Oxford, wounded at the Somme, spent time in India setting up an office for Oxford University Press and learning his trade, and in the 1920s and 1930s worked for Country Life and Kynoch Press. All this is typical of his time and background, but he soon brought fresh ideas and vision to publishing, and started by commissioning Eric Ravilious and Edward Bawden. This is one of the notebooks with engravings by Ravilious which were given to clients to demonstrate the quality of the Press' printing and binding.