 <p>Well you can, although I have to warn you there are several problems with a layout like this. Be sure to understand them before using this. </p> <p>The HTML required is: </p> <pre><code>&lt;div id="container"&gt; &lt;div id="inside"&gt; &lt;div id="offside"&gt; &lt;/div&gt; &lt;div id="center"&gt; &lt;/div&gt; &lt;/div&gt; &lt;/div&gt; </code></pre> <p>There are two layers of wrappers here. We using the usual <code>margin: 0 auto</code> technique with the outside container to center it, while the inside <code>div</code> gets a negative left margin equal to the width of the off-center <code>div</code>. </p> <pre><code>#container { width: 300px; margin: 0 auto; } #container #inside { margin-left: -100px; overflow: hidden; } #container #inside div { float: left; height: 400px; } #container #inside #offside { width: 100px; background-color: #ddd; } #container #inside #center { width: 300px; background-color: #f9f9f9; } </code></pre> <p>Have a look at it here: <a href="http://www.jsfiddle.net/DfArr/1/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://www.jsfiddle.net/DfArr/1/</a></p>