The Founder's Story
The Origin
Hey, I'm Connor Sapp. Founder and CEO of Veleura.
As I grew older, my perspective on "living well" started to shift.
During my college years, I started to really prioritize optimization. I became obsessed with the details like nutrition, recovery, and overall wellness. I realized that how you do one thing is how you do everything, and I wanted my environment to be intentional, clean, and functional.
But there was one part of my day that was consistently chaotic, no matter how hard I tried to fix it: My sleep.
I founded Veleura for a selfish reason: I am 6'5", and traditional bedding wasn't designed for me. I’m someone who needs my sheets tucked in to feel grounded, but at my height, keeping them tucked was a near-impossible task. Every night, I would kick the top sheet loose. Every morning, I would wake up in a tangle and have to remake the bed sometimes from scratch.
It might sound small, but starting every day with that small frustration made me crazy.
This is what I would regularly wake up to
In January 2025, I finally found the fix. I thought, Why don't I just sew the top sheet to the fitted sheet? That way, it can never untuck.
Conveniently, my grandmother was visiting for the holidays. I asked her for a crash course in sewing. We took a set of old, low-quality sheets that I had been "ignorantly comfortable" with for years (pilling fabric, fading colors) and we went to work. I spent the day measuring, cutting, and stitching the two sheets together.
Prototype 1
Functionally, it was perfect. For the first time, my bed stayed made. But the material was terrible, and I knew my amateur sewing job wouldn't last. I realized this couldn't just be a DIY project; it had to be a product.
That was the moment Veleura was born.
The Standard
But I didn't just want to build a solution to this problem. I wanted to build an ethical one.
Back in the summer of 2024, I interned in London for Niall Kiddle, the founder of Organised. It was incredible watching how he operates, sharing his rigorous whole foods diet and wellness-focused lifestyle with over half a million followers on his personal Instagram. He lived and breathed what his public persona portrayed.
With that many eyes on him, there was zero room for compromise. The integrity of the product itself had to be absolute. The brand was built entirely on farm-centered ethics, keeping everything pure, functional, and natural.
2024 Health Optimization Summit, London
I also had the opportunity to man the Organised booth at the 2024 Health Optimization Summit, handing out cups of raw milk mixed with our product. There, I saw the overwhelming demand for intentional living. I met hundreds of people who lived holistic, natural lives but were underserved by the market.
Looking back, this sparked a realization: if I was going to disrupt the bedding industry, I couldn't just fix the "tuck." I had to honor the materials, the environment, the people involved in making it, and the people who sleep on it.
The Search for Solus
I spent the next few months hunting for the perfect intersection of design and ethics.
It wasn't easy. I needed a partner willing to execute a custom, non-standard design while adhering to strict environmental standards. I reached out to countless suppliers, facing rejections and "maybes," until I finally found a partner that aligned with my values: a Fair Trade facility in India using 100% Organic Cotton.
The Thread Count Myth
During this process, I also had to unlearn a lot of marketing gimmicks. Like most people, I associated "High Thread Count" with luxury. I assumed that if I wanted quality, I needed 800 or 1,000 threads.
But as I researched the engineering behind the fabric, I found the opposite. Extremely high thread counts often rely on thinner, weaker threads twisted together to inflate the numbers. They tend to be less durable and less breathable.
I decided to test a 300-thread-count, long-staple organic cotton instead. I expected it to feel basic. Instead, I was blown away. It was soft in ways words can't describe—smooth, buttery, almost silky. It proved to me that the quality of the fiber matters far more than the number of fibers.
The Prototyping
The prototyping phase was a lesson in patience:
- Attempt 1 (The Material Test): From my new supplier, I ordered that 300 TC organic cotton fabric on a regular set of sheets. It was phenomenal. Smooth, breathable, and it actually got softer with every wash.
- Attempt 2 (The Design Test): I tried a different weave with the new anchored design. I wasn't a fan of the material. It felt wrong on the skin, but functionally? It was perfect.
- The Final Polish: I reverted to that original, incredible organic cotton and applied my anchored architecture to it. Now we're talking.
The Result
I remember sleeping in that final prototype for the first time. It was a completely different experience. The cotton was cool and soft against my skin, but more importantly, the stress was gone. I moved freely during the night, but the sheet stayed with me. When I woke up, there was no tangle to fight. All I had to do that morning to make my bed was pull my sheet and comforter up. No re-tucking or corner adjusting needed.
We named the product Solus—Latin for "Alone" or "Only." It reflects the simplicity of a single-solution system that replaces the chaos of traditional bedding.
It has been a long road of research, sewing lessons, and supplier collaboration, but I believe we have finally built the bedding the world deserves. It’s not just a better sheet; it's a guarantee that when you start your day, your sheets will be the last thing you worry about.
I am proud to finally share it with you.
— Connor Sapp, Founder
