diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index a6504cd..99c2efb 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -78,6 +78,10 @@ If your container exposes multiple ports, nginx-proxy will default to the servic
 
 If you need to support multiple virtual hosts for a container, you can separate each entry with commas.  For example, `foo.bar.com,baz.bar.com,bar.com` and each host will be setup the same.
 
+### Manually Specifying Upstream IP
+
+In case you need to manually override the Upstream IP that Nginx will proxy to, you can declare a VIRTUAL_IP env var. If you do this, you also need to declare the VIRTUAL_PORT env variable as this switches the behaviour to a more "manual" declaration style. This is useful if one of your containers is in `network_mode: host` for instance.
+
 ### Wildcard Hosts
 
 You can also use wildcards at the beginning and the end of host name, like `*.bar.com` or `foo.bar.*`. Or even a regular expression, which can be very useful in conjunction with a wildcard DNS service like [xip.io](http://xip.io), using `~^foo\.bar\..*\.xip\.io` will match `foo.bar.127.0.0.1.xip.io`, `foo.bar.10.0.2.2.xip.io` and all other given IPs. More information about this topic can be found in the nginx documentation about [`server_names`](http://nginx.org/en/docs/http/server_names.html).
diff --git a/nginx.tmpl b/nginx.tmpl
index d861050..2fab840 100644
--- a/nginx.tmpl
+++ b/nginx.tmpl
@@ -1,7 +1,10 @@
 {{ $CurrentContainer := where $ "ID" .Docker.CurrentContainerID | first }}
 
 {{ define "upstream" }}
-	{{ if .Address }}
+  {{ if and .IP .Port }}
+    # {{ .Container.Name }} with manually set IP
+    server {{ .IP }}:{{ .Port }};
+	{{ else if .Address }}
 		{{/* If we got the containers from swarm and this container's port is published to host, use host IP:PORT */}}
 		{{ if and .Container.Node.ID .Address.HostPort }}
 			# {{ .Container.Node.Name }}/{{ .Container.Name }}
@@ -19,7 +22,6 @@
 			server 127.0.0.1 down;
 		{{ end }}
 	{{ end }}
-	
 {{ end }}
 
 # If we receive X-Forwarded-Proto, pass it through; otherwise, pass along the
@@ -126,28 +128,34 @@ upstream {{ $upstream_name }} {
 
 {{ range $container := $containers }}
 	{{ $addrLen := len $container.Addresses }}
+  {{ if and $container.Env.VIRTUAL_IP $container.Env.VIRTUAL_HOST }}
+    # Manually defined upstream host and port
+    {{ $IP := coalesce $container.Env.VIRTUAL_IP "127.0.0.1" }}
+    {{ $Port := coalesce $container.Env.VIRTUAL_PORT "80" }}
+    {{ template "upstream" (dict "Container" $container "Port" $Port "IP" $IP) }}
+  {{ else }}
+    {{ range $knownNetwork := $CurrentContainer.Networks }}
+  		{{ range $containerNetwork := $container.Networks }}
+        {{ if (and (ne $containerNetwork.Name "ingress") (or (eq $knownNetwork.Name $containerNetwork.Name) (eq $knownNetwork.Name "host"))) }}
+          ## Can be connected with "{{ $containerNetwork.Name }}" network
 
-	{{ range $knownNetwork := $CurrentContainer.Networks }}
-		{{ range $containerNetwork := $container.Networks }}
-			{{ if (and (ne $containerNetwork.Name "ingress") (or (eq $knownNetwork.Name $containerNetwork.Name) (eq $knownNetwork.Name "host"))) }}
-				## Can be connected with "{{ $containerNetwork.Name }}" network
-
-				{{/* If only 1 port exposed, use that */}}
-				{{ if eq $addrLen 1 }}
-					{{ $address := index $container.Addresses 0 }}
-					{{ template "upstream" (dict "Container" $container "Address" $address "Network" $containerNetwork) }}
-				{{/* If more than one port exposed, use the one matching VIRTUAL_PORT env var, falling back to standard web port 80 */}}
-				{{ else }}
-					{{ $port := coalesce $container.Env.VIRTUAL_PORT "80" }}
-					{{ $address := where $container.Addresses "Port" $port | first }}
-					{{ template "upstream" (dict "Container" $container "Address" $address "Network" $containerNetwork) }}
-				{{ end }}
-			{{ else }}
-				# Cannot connect to network of this container
-				server 127.0.0.1 down;
-			{{ end }}
-		{{ end }}
-	{{ end }}
+          {{/* If only 1 port exposed, use that */}}
+          {{ if eq $addrLen 1 }}
+            {{ $address := index $container.Addresses 0 }}
+            {{ template "upstream" (dict "Container" $container "Address" $address "Network" $containerNetwork) }}
+          {{/* If more than one port exposed, use the one matching VIRTUAL_PORT env var, falling back to standard web port 80 */}}
+          {{ else }}
+            {{ $port := coalesce $container.Env.VIRTUAL_PORT "80" }}
+            {{ $address := where $container.Addresses "Port" $port | first }}
+            {{ template "upstream" (dict "Container" $container "Address" $address "Network" $containerNetwork) }}
+          {{ end }}
+        {{ else }}
+          # Cannot connect to network of this container
+          server 127.0.0.1 down;
+        {{ end }}
+  		{{ end }}
+  	{{ end }}
+  {{ end }}
 {{ end }}
 }