Critically acclaimed, gender-fluid drag queen, visual artist, speaker, illustrator, and newly minted author Sasha Velour has been a force in the international drag scene long before her scene-stealing, rose-petal-filled win on season nine of “RuPaul’s Drag Race.”  As a modern-day pioneer of innovative, emotive, and provocative drag aesthetics, Velour continues to raise the bar for the art of drag performance across the globe.

Velour is most notably recognized as the winner of season nine of the Emmy-nominated “RuPaul’s Drag Race” on VH1 in 2017.  Her lip-sync performance to Whitney Houston’s “So Emotional” made history for the competition series, hailed as “the performance of the year” by The A.V. Club and named one of “TV’s Best Musical Moments on Television” by Entertainment Weekly.  The act cleverly featured an elaborate reveal full of rose petals hidden in her gloves and wig and is now widely regarded as one of the most iconic performances in the show’s history, having contributed to a 500% increase in streaming plays of the song that summer and catapulted Velour’s star power into publications such as VOGUE, ELLE, Rolling Stone, and The New York Times, to name just a few.  To this day, many “RuPaul’s Drag Race” aficionados still rank Velour as an all-time top contestant on the series (with over 17 regular US seasons) and queens across the world still flock to Velour for her iconic looks and prized makeup technique.

Ingenuity is not something new to Velour, as her live performances have been renowned by critics as “an entirely new level of performance art” (Yahoo!) and “heart-wrenching” (Billboard).  Her first one-queen drag show “Smoke & Mirrors” toured from 2019-2022 and was seen by over 100K people in over 80 cities around the world including sold-out performances at the prestigious London Palladium and the Folies Bergère in Paris, alongside New York City, Los Angeles, Vancouver, Auckland, Warsaw, Bogotá, and more.  Velour’s esteemed drag show “NightGowns,” founded in 2015, has hosted some of the world’s greatest drag performers before being adapted into a docu-series directed by Sophie Muller and The Documentary Group in 2020.  In 2021, the cast released two original “NightGowns” films: “NightGowns Forever,” an anthology of past shows, and “NightGowns the Musical,” an original comedy set in 1967, performed Off-Broadway in June 2021. Her latest tour “The Big Reveal Live Show” began as a promotional tour for her first book but evolved into a hilarious 90 minute drag spectacular which has wowed audiences in the US, Canada, and across Europe.

In Spring of 2024, Sasha appeared as one of the four new hosts on the fourth season of the Peabody Award-winning “We’re Here” on HBO. The final season of the show was nominated for two Critics Choice Awards.

Most recently, she was commissioned by Tectonic Theatre Project to create a new play based on her book and life. “Velour: A Drag Spectacular” premiered at the prestigious La Jolla Playhouse in California in summer ‘24. The play, hailed by the LA Times as “an unalloyed delight”, was the first play in the playhouse’s history to extend it’s sold-out run!

Velour’s talents also expand beyond the drag universe, as her artist profile continues to transcend boundaries and mediums untouched by many other queens.  Velour’s studio and illustration work has been the subject of two acclaimed solo gallery shows in New York in 2014 and 2016 before being tapped by Google to draw their homepage search engine doodle of the late Marlene Dietrich in celebration of her 116th birthday in 2017. She was also commissioned by The New Yorker to create a self-portrait for their cover in June 2023. Together with her partner Johnny, she also self-published and designed the art magazine “Velour,” now released in the hardcover collector’s edition, which celebrates the art of drag through visual art, poetry, photography, and essays.  Velour frequently uses her platform to discuss politics, queer history, and LGBTQ+ issues in an educational format, having transformed her into a highly sought-after public speaker.  Velour has graced the stages at prestigious venues and events, including The Smithsonian for “The Long Conversation,” an event with thought leaders from around the world, US Embassies in Singapore, Bogota, and Oslo, and many distinguished colleges and universities including The University of British Columbia, UC Davis, Purdue, The University of Illinois, the University of North Carolina-Wilmington, and Columbia University. Velour’s appearance on “Good Morning America”  in 2023, in which she spoke against the anti-drag backlash, was nominated for a GLAAD award.

In Spring 2023, Velour released her debut book, “The Big Reveal: An Illustrated Manifesto of Drag,” published by Harper Collins. Billed as a first-of-its-kind, “spellbinding” work, Velour’s work thoughtfully weaves memoir, history, and theory into a living portrait of an artist and an art. Throughout the book, Velour illuminates drag as a unique form of expression with a rich history and a revolutionary spirit as she recalls her own journey and uncovers the history of queer life around the world that made it all possible.  The spellbinding book highlights both Velour’s intellect and imagination, featuring photos and her original artwork and illustrations intertwined with insightful critical theory, riveting LGBTQ+ history, memoir, and all-engrossing camp. “The Big Reveal” is available where all fine books are sold.

Velour is the only child of Mark D. Steinberg, a professor of History (aka “Papa Velour”) and Jane T. Hedges, a copyeditor who passed of cancer in 2015.  It was her family who first encouraged her to dress up and perform, especially her grandmothers Dina, a Jewish immigrant from Harbin, and Jo, a libertarian librarian from rural Michigan.  Velour currently resides in Brooklyn, NY, with her partner Johnny and their beloved Italian Greyhound progeny, the fabulous Vanya Velour.