How do I mimic floats with flexbox? - css

Question

I am trying to use flexbox like floats. I would like 1 child to form a column on the right and the remaining children to form another column on the left. I can't add in additional HTML -- I can only work with CSS.
I've figured out how to do this, but I just need both columns to align at the top. My current code has the left column slightly below the right column.
https://jsfiddle.net/o2fbtuLc/
.parent {
display: flex;
flex-wrap: wrap;
flex-direction: column;
}
.child {
max-width: 48%;
}
.right {
margin-left: auto;
}
<div class="parent">
<div class="child right">Right</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
</div>

Answer 1

You can use order. Also I removed flex-direction: column and added max-width: 100% for elements after second element.
.parent {
display: flex;
flex-wrap: wrap;
}
.child {
width: 100%;
max-width: 48%;
}
.child:nth-child(2) {
order: 1;
}
.child:nth-child(3) {
order: 3;
}
.child:nth-child(4) {
order: 4;
}
.right {
order: 2;
}
.child:nth-child(n + 3) {
max-width: 100%;
}
<div class="parent">
<div class="child right">Right</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
</div>
If .right is taller, we can consider using grid-area.
.parent {
display: grid;
grid-template-areas: "left1 right"
"left2 right"
"left3 right";
}
.child {
width: 100%;
background: blue;
height: 30px;
}
.child:nth-child(2) {
grid-area: left1;
}
.child:nth-child(3) {
grid-area: left2;
}
.child:nth-child(4) {
grid-area: left3;
}
.right {
background: red;
height: 80px;
grid-area: right;
}
<div class="parent">
<div class="child right">Right</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
</div>

Answer 2

CSS-Grid can do that:
.parent {
display: grid;
grid-template-columns: auto auto;
grid-auto-flow: column;
}
.child {
max-width: 48%;
grid-column: 1;
border: 1px solid green;
}
.right {
grid-column: 2;
}
<div class="parent">
<div class="child right">Right</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child right">Right</div>
</div>

Answer 3

If you want to avoid grid (IE 11 involved maybe ?) , the old way via the table-display, can do too :
.parent {
display: table;
width: 100%;
direction: rtl;/* alike a flow column reverse here */
text-align: left;
border: solid;
}
.child {
direction: ltr;/* ! reset flow direction ;)*/
border: solid;
}
.right {/* i will also expand if first col is longer than myself */
display: table-cell;
width: 50%;/* set column width here ! left over will be for the other one(s). */
}
/* margins ? */
.bis {border-spacing:2px;}
.bis .child {margin-right:2px;}
.bis .right + .child ~ .child {margin-top:2px;}
.bis .right{text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;
<div class="parent">
<div class="child right">Right</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
</div>
<hr>
<div class="parent bis">
<div class="child right">possible gaps / VH-align</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">two<br>lines</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
</div>

Answer 4

just use flexbox as it was intended!
.parent {
display: flex;
justify-content:space-between;
}
<div class="parent">
<div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div>
<div class="child">Left</div></div>
<div class="child right">Right</div>
</div>