Hi Grace,

The short answer is, because of the “too”. <em>Too </em>actually means “something is very [adjective], and it’s a bad thing”. It is not simply a way to make an adjective more intense; it has that negative aspect to it.

Okay, so <em>It was too big a project. </em>Good sentence, although usually you have a complement: ...<em>for our team, ...to leave to one person, ...to finish over the holidays. </em>

But anyway, what if you are a young speaker and you want to put emphasis on the size of the problem you have? You intensify the negative <em>too </em>with <em>way. Very too big a project </em>is ungrammatical. <em>Really too big a project </em>sounds formal, like something an older speaker would say.

“Way” can be used to emphasize how big the project was. Whether you say “it was too big a project” or “it was way too big a project” both are saying it was too big, too much to handle, etc.

Here are some other ways to use “way” to emphasize something:

“It was way too hot out to do yard work”

”He was way too tired after work to go to the party”

”There are way too many things in my closet”

Hope this helps!!

'Way' in this sense is simply used in the sense of 'much'.

It was much too big.

It is informal and is simply a way of emphasizing something. It does not take on its normal meaning of 'path or manner or means' here.

Way means, a means of doing something. Everybody has their own way of speaking.

Way also means a route from A to B, it does not have to be a route like on a journey it can also be the way means to complete a task, job = the way [route by which you will complete and navigate the journey through the task/ job from start to finish.

Very is an emphasising adjective and way before is an additional adjective describing that it is way to big to complete, by any means or by any {way journey}

And sometimes you will hear some speakers add in an extra way.

"It was way, way too big a project"

So it is just adding onto the idea of a big project too big to complete, the extra notions of by any means or by whatever method, combined possibly also with the meaning of way as a route/journey through the job, start to finish.

"It was way to big a project, we would have never finished it in a million years"= a common Expression.