Question

I know that it is possible to make multiple background layers with CSS, but can I layer multiple backgrounds coming from different classes?
Say I had divs acting as tiles that could have mountains or hills and could belong to a certain country.

.mountain {
    background: url("mountain.png");
}
.hill {
    background: url("hill.png");
}
.bluecountry {
    background: url("bluecountry.png");
}
.redcountry {
    background: url("redcountry.png");
}
.greencountry {
    background: url("greencountry.png");
}

would be my css. However, this doesn’t work; when I do something like

<div class="hill bluecountry">

it will not layer the backgrounds, and will only use one of them.
Is there any way to make this work? I actually have more stuff than this, and it would be a huge waste of time to have to individually write CSS multiple backgrounds for every possible combination.

Answer 1

There’s no way to merge the background attribute using multiple classes — it can only be set once. What you could do is:

1. create a container div (position: relative)
2. place multiple divs inside the container (position: absolute)
3. apply a separate class to each sub-div
4. The images can each be positioned within the container by using top: 0px; left: 0px;, and with background-position.

Here’s an example of what I mean:

HTML

<div class="container">
    <div class="first"></div>
    <div class="second"></div>
</div>​

CSS

html, body { height: 100%; }
div { 
    display: inline-block;
    width: 400px; 
    height: 100px; 
}
.container {
    position: relative;
}
.first, .second {
    position: absolute;
    left: 0;
    top: 0;
}
.first { 
    background: url(http://picsum.photos/200/100/?random=1) no-repeat; 
}
.second { 
    background: url(http://picsum.photos/200/100/?random=2) no-repeat; 
    background-position: right center;
}

http://jsfiddle.net/chriskorosu/z269x0oc/1/