Nothing that a transform(90deg) cannot solve :-). More seriously, what you describe is quite doable with flexbox (flex-direction: row, flex-wrap: wrap and flex

Nothing that a transform(90deg) cannot solve :-). More seriously, what you describe is quite doable with flexbox (flex-direction: row, flex-wrap: wrap and flex-grow: 1). Interestingly, even the Masonry layout was already doable using a simple multi-column layout, the "only" issue is that instead of having the items left-to-right, top-to-bottom (ordered by row) you have them top-to-bottom, left-to-right (ordered by column) which is not what you want most of the times