Funding the challenge part three

One of the necklaces rejected by pawnbrokers and removed from Facebook is as old as I am. The year I was born my grandmother, one of ten children, went on the voyage of a lifetime with one of her sisters from Staffordshire, to visit their eldest sister who was permanently resident in the USA. They stayed in America for six months, sightseeing and travelling around to visit all the nieces and nephews and great-nieces and great-nephews, even attending a family wedding. Along the way they were given many gifts to bring home, including jewellery.

My grandmother kept a diary during the trip. It's clear she was overwhelmed and amazed by the abundance of everything in 1950s America. It contrasted sharply with the scarcity of most things in England not too long after the end of wartime rationing. So Gran kept everything and packed it all carefully to bring home. I still have ephemera, menus from on board her cruise liner, many postcards and letters, a wealth of photographs, and a statement necklace with chains and pearls.

It's a heavy thing to wear, albeit attractive, and I don't share my Gran's post-war keep-everything mentality. Having decided I would probably never wear it, and didn't need it, I tried to sell it. It is not intrinsically valuable but unusual and certainly vintage. Somebody was bound to want it, I thought.

The third attempt to find the necklace a new home came about because I was sitting in front of live television with adverts showing. That's unusual. Normally I take the ad breaks as an excuse to get up and move around, make a cup of tea, or surf other channels to see what else is showing. But not this time, I was full of a cold, not feeling well, so I stayed put, and became aware of a company called Vinted that offers a platform to buy and sell second-hand belongings. I didn't know of it, hadn't tried it before, it fit my criteria for trying 70 new things this year. The ad seemed to reach me at the perfect time. Should I give it a try?

Rather than diving straight in, I spent some time on the Vinted website looking at brands and categories, and terms and conditions, and tons of STUFF presented as in a shop window. Like my Gran in 1955 I was amazed. However, I didn't sell the necklace. I did find a lovely pair of new shoes that ticked many boxes, and bought those. When they arrived they were practically perfect, apart from odd shoelaces. I kept the shoes anyway (and bought new matching shoelaces at the local market). My funding attempts were going backwards. Nevertheless, I decided that Vinted was probably not the right platform for me.

#9 of 70 buying shoes through Vinted