Big Pony 2, one part of the new, four-scent collection Ralph Lauren Big Pony 2, one part of the new, four-scent collection Ralph Lauren

Big Pony 2, one part of the new, four-scent collection Ralph Lauren launched this month, is a reminder of the tantalizing possibilities for provocative, beautiful masculines amid the current stultifying sea of Cool Water knockoffs. It is also evidence of the reluctance of L'Oréal, which owns the Ralph Lauren brand's perfume license, to give perfumers serious budgets so they can put quality materials into the juices. http://buscatuperfume.blogspot.com/

Without money for formula, perhaps the great Germaine Cellier would have come up not with the inimitable Fracas in 1948, but with a pale, synthetic-smelling tuberose – pretty enough, maybe, and certainly based on a great concept, but lacking the heavy engineering needed to really make the machine go.

And concept alone is never sufficient. Architect Richard Meier's gorgeous, soaring Jubilee Church in Rome is a contemporary wonder – the doors were opened to great fanfare in 2003 – but it would have been a disaster if developer Lamaro Appalti S.p.A. had not been allocated the budget for the right quality of concrete and steel.

Big Pony 2, created by Antoine Lie, one of the most marvelously inventive and technically expert perfumers around, and Ellen Molner, who has an excellent commercial touch, is an achievement of concept and development. The commercial aspect of the collection is admittedly crucial; Ralph Lauren's creative team primarily aims to sell units – well-made, solid, accessible-luxury units, true – so "avant garde" is not in the brand's vocabulary. Ralph Lauren is not out to revolutionize the masculine scent – yet they've taken a step in that direction.

I don't know if Lie and Molner are familiar with the work of superlative perfumer Maurice Roucel. Within the art-house collection of the brand Bond No. 9, New Haarlem, a 2004 fragrance made by Roucel, is possibly the best – a work of olfactory art, with overt scents of chocolate, lush fruit and flapper lipstick. It is potent and mesmerizing, and it testifies to Roucel's precise control of his medium.

Moreover, Haarlem is a masterpiece not merely in every aspect of its construction, technical performance and aesthetic innovation, but also in its vast and powerful olfactory invocation of an entire historical place and era – jazz and Prohibition-era Harlem, and the thrill and decadence that characterized it.

Lie and Molner have, too, created a masculine that actually constitutes an authentic, exciting step into avant-garde territory. Big Pony 2 has a terrific opening, revealing a concept of chocolate, both sweet and bitter, and an angle (very low, but definitely palpable) of the spiced silk of Opium with a gourmand aspect virtually nonexistent in masculine perfumery. Yes, Lie and Molner have done this to make this scent acceptable at a university club, and they've mated this forward-looking olfactory body to a resolutely traditionalist Ralph Lauren masculine chassis – a "fresh, clean" just-showered guy exiting the gym. Still, it is a new and interesting concept.

However, the creators of Big Pony 2 were simply not given the money to build a solid scent. It is more or less universally known throughout the industry that L'Oréal is conflicted about budgets. They want quality, but give perfumers little money with which to build quality. In the case of Big Pony 2, the chocolate-light spice tease remains just that – a great idea that soon burns off, leaving a perfectly competent but ordinary masculine to carry on until it, too, simply vanishes from the skin.

In this collection of four scents, could they not have gone further with just one? Could they not have taken one risk? A guy could always simply reapply relatively frequently – the scent is light enough that it is almost impossible to overdose. But the point is that the promise of this marvelous, darkly sweet kiss is merely a promise. Perhaps the next Ralph Lauren masculine will roll up its sleeves and follow through.

Chandler Burr is the perfume critic for T: The New York Times Style Magazine and author of The Emperor of Scent, The Perfect Scent and a novel, You or Someone Like You.

Big Pony 2

by Ralph Lauren

125 ml: $65

www.bigpony fragrances.com