Vertical space in table (not arraystretch)

Question

I want a vertical space in one row of a table without stretching out all rows of the table. The suggestions I see all involve \arraystretch{}, but I want the text-only row to still be small.

\documentclass{article}


\begin{document}

\begin{tabular}{|c|c|}
\hline
Tally of pink beads     & Tally of blue beads \\ \hline
\vspace{.5in}     &  \\ \hline
\end{tabular}
\vfill

\end{document}

Answer 1

Insert a vertical strut (a zero-width \rule) of appropriate length (height):

\documentclass{article}

\begin{document}

\begin{tabular}{ | c | c | }
  \hline
  Tally of pink beads & Tally of blue beads \\
  \hline
  \vspace{.5in}       &                     \\
  \hline
\end{tabular}

\bigskip

\begin{tabular}{ | c | c | }
  \hline
  Tally of pink beads & Tally of blue beads \\
  \hline
  \rule{0pt}{.5in}    &                     \\
  \hline
\end{tabular}


\end{document}

In your setup (with \vspace) the vertical space is inserted after the line break \\ when the vertical rules for that row has already been inserted. So, setting a zero-width \rule within the line keeps TeX in horizontal mode, allowing the vertical rules to stretch across the entire row's height.