margin-top not working with clear: both

Answer 1

Try setting a bottom margin on one of the floated elements. Alternatively, you can wrap the floats in a parent element, and use a css hack to clear it without additional markup.

Answer 2

Alternative solution:

You can actually put a margin-bottom on the floated elements to push DOWN the element underneath that has clear: both.

http://jsfiddle.net/9EY4R/

Note: Having made this suggestion I have to immediately retract it as not generally a good idea, but in some limited situations may appropriate;

---

<div class='order'>

    <div class='address'>
        <strong>Your order will be shipped to:</strong><br>
        Simon</br>
        123 Main St<br>
        Anytown, CA, US
    </div>

    <div class='order-details'>
        Item 1<br>
        Item 2<br>
        Item 3<br>
        Item 4<br>
        Item 5<br>
        Item 6<br>
        Item 7<br>
        Item 8<br>
        Item 9<br>
        Item 10<br>
    </div>

    <div class='options'>
        <button>Edit</button>
        <button>Save</button>
    </div>
</div>

The panel with items is called order-details with this css

.order-details
{
    padding: .5em;
    background: lightsteelblue;

    float: left;
    margin-left: 1em;

    /* this margin does take effect */
    margin-bottom: 1em;
}

In the above fiddle - the yellow panel has a margin-top, but unless it is greater than the tallest floated item then it won't do anything (of course that's the whole point of this question).

If you set the margin-top of the yellow panel to 20em then it will be visible because the margin is calculated from the top of the outer blue box.