I don't think you can accomplish quite as much as you want with just css styling a <select> tag. This is about how far it goes: http://ryanfait.com/resources/custom-checkboxes-and-radio-buttons/

I would suggest using other elements, like <div>s to accomplish what you want, and a little bit of javascript (jQuery, MooTools) for the added effects.

It seems like you need a JavaScript image combobox. The article is pretty straightforward, and i believe you can customize it even further than whats written in the article. Give it a shot! :-)

I use jQuery plugin prettySelectBox, recommend it. http://abeautifulsite.net/blog/2011/01/jquery-selectbox-plugin/

Select elements are the ones which less customization acepts, so your freedom to style them is very limited.

In order to achive what you are looking for, I suggest you to build your own select-like component using custom HTML, JavaScript and CSS.

If you want to use an already existing one, I suggest you to take a look at the following links:

• jquery-selectbox
• custom-combobox

However, since what you are looking for is too specific, probably you will need to create your dropdown in your own.

Styling selects is notoriously difficult - browser vendors have not allowed for widespread custom styling on form elements.

One way to get around it is to use javascript, maybe with a library such as jQuery.

There's some good answers and links to plugins on this page: Is it possible to style a select box?

HTML <select> tag is part of a larger set, called HTML form controls. They are different types of <input> tag, <select> tag, <textarea>. The most common known issues of HTML form elements (controls) is that, they don't have cross-browser look & feel. In other words, while a browser may animate a drop-down menu (a select element), another browser may open it up abruptly and at-once. Thus, a known web-design and development practice, is to create your custom controls, from scratch using simple elements and JavaScript (usually jQuery). Thus, I recommend that you create it on your own, instead of trying to find out how to make what you want (and to be honest, I think what you're looking for is not possible, since nesting block-level elements inside <option> tags are not allowed, if you want to have valid HTML).