A Maltese woman has come out with an innovative website to help plus-sized women shop.

“I think the mainstream brick and mortar retailers are afraid to step out and be different from the rest of the crowd and from what the major (fashion) labels are saying,” says Sarah Testa, founder and executive editor of www.pasazz.net, an on-line shopping guide for plus-sized women.

Ms Testa, a curvy 23-year-old Web marketing specialist, lives on what Helen Malani described as “the beautiful but shopping-challenged island of Malta’ on Shopzilla.com. So she turned to the Internet to fill her wardrobe and created the site in 2003 to help other women.

This month, she launched a newsletter, “Loving My Curves”, featuring style trends, shopping tips, sales and discount information for women who are too busy to check the site regularly.