Fifteen years after she was crowned Miss North Carolina’s Outstanding Teen, and ten years after she was crowned Miss North Carolina, McKenzie Jade Faggart holds a place in our history that continues to inspire.
She was the first woman ever to wear both crowns.
It is a milestone that deserves to be said out loud, and this year — with both milestones landing at once — is the right moment to celebrate it.
Miss North Carolina's Teen 2011
She had been a competition dancer since she was two years old. That matters because when McKenzie walked onto our stage for the first time, her dance was not just a talent she had prepared for competition week. It was the thing she had been doing her entire life.
She was a teenager from Concord. Pageantry was already part of her family’s story — her mother had been crowned Miss Charlotte Mecklenburg years before. But McKenzie had only entered her first Miss America preliminary in November of 2010. Within months, she was Miss North Carolina’s Outstanding Teen, and on the path to representing her state on the national stage.
She traveled to Florida and made the Top 12 at Miss America’s Outstanding Teen — and was named America’s Choice, the country voting her forward as their favorite from the week.
But her accomplishments at the national level were not the whole story of that year. She left a lasting impact across her home state.
The S.A.F.E. Project | Created to prevent bullying, McKenzie championed the S.A.F.E. Project, where she encouraged everyone to Support one another, Accept differences and individuality, Forgive wrongdoings or ask for forgiveness, and Evolve into a better self, stronger than before. Her stories inspired peers and children at every appearance she made during her reign.
Miss North Carolina 2016
McKenzie later served as Miss Cabarrus County, Miss Queen City, and Miss Mecklenburg County, while studying mass communications at UNC Charlotte and dancing as a Charlotte 49ers Gold Duster.
Five years after leading the state in the Teen division, she was back on the state stage to show the judges what she could do as a Miss contestant. And she came to think of the whole pursuit as something her family would recognize.
Her father was a race car driver. Her hometown is the home of NASCAR. She grew up at the Concord and Charlotte speedways watching him chase what he wanted. So she stopped thinking of Miss North Carolina as a competition, and started thinking of it as a race — not a sprint toward a finish line, but laps. Test runs. Mistakes that taught her something. Flags and rules that kept her on track.
That is where #RaceToTheCrown was born. And of the people who got her there, she has said it plainly: “My pit crew was the team of people who helped me get there.”
In June of 2016, competing as Miss Mecklenburg County, she took the stage at Memorial Auditorium in Raleigh and danced a lyrical performance to “Rise Up.”
When they called her name, McKenzie Jade Faggart became the 79th Miss North Carolina — and the first woman in the history of this organization to hold both of our state’s titles. She said later that it happened fast and slow at the same time. That in the blink of an eye, she was Miss North Carolina.
She spent much of her year of service in schools. Not just a handful — schools across North Carolina, elementary through high, standing in front of students and telling them stories about her experiences. She put her platform into practice. Not a talking point. A year of showing up. One student, a 4th-grader at Bethel Elementary, published a story stating that McKenzie “taught me so much about life,” adding, “I feel like I can see this world in a new, beautiful way because of her.”
In September, she represented North Carolina at Miss America in Atlantic City, where she was recognized with a Non-Finalist Talent Award — a national honor and a fitting one for a dancer who had been working toward this achievement since she was two.
And then she took her farewell walk, which she has described as the final lap of her MAO race.
McKenzie Jade in 2026
In November of 2018, at twenty-four years old, she opened McKenzie Jade’s in Kannapolis. Nearly eight years later, it is a must-visit destination for pageant, prom, and bridal, serving clients from across the country, and it has grown to include Jade Girl Boutique and McKenzie Jade’s Bridal. She has dressed thousands of contestants. She has styled state and national titleholders. She works as a buyer influencer for Atlanta Apparel. And she teaches dance at the same studio where she trained as a girl.
Checkered flags run through the store. Because she built the business on the same idea she built her year on — that every girl with a dream deserves a strong pit crew behind her. She has spent nearly a decade being exactly that.
Consider this: in June 2026, Camdyn Lee was crowned Miss North Carolina’s Teen 2026 — representing Cabarrus County, the local title McKenzie herself carried when she won as a Teen in 2011. Lee was crowned in a McKenzie Jade’s gown. She won a Preliminary Evening Gown Award wearing it.
Fifteen years later, the first young woman to wear both crowns is still helping the next one get there, year after year.
Fifteen years. Ten years. Two crowns. One legacy.
McKenzie — you once said your pit crew was the team of people who helped you get there. For nearly ten years, you have been that for hundreds of other people’s daughters. This year, we celebrate our opportunity to experience your pit crew.
Thank you. From all of us in the Miss North Carolina Organization. 🏁
