You can use visibility
css property. From sitepoint reference -
This property specifies whether an
element is visible—that is, whether
the box(es) that are generated by an
element are rendered.
Note that even if a box in the normal
flow is hidden, it still affects the
layout of other elements, unlike the
behavior that occurs when we suppress
box generation altogether by setting
display to none. Descendant boxes of a
hidden box will be visible if their
visibility is set to visible, whereas
descendants of an element for which
display is set to none can never
generate boxes of their own.
More information can be found here.