diff --git a/spacy/_ml.py b/spacy/_ml.py
index 3bb76c268..2e95aa55b 100644
--- a/spacy/_ml.py
+++ b/spacy/_ml.py
@@ -512,8 +512,11 @@ def build_tagger_model(nr_class, **cfg):
         token_vector_width = util.env_opt('token_vector_width', 128)
     pretrained_dims = cfg.get('pretrained_dims', 0)
     with Model.define_operators({'>>': chain, '+': add}):
-        tok2vec = Tok2Vec(token_vector_width, embed_size,
-                          pretrained_dims=pretrained_dims)
+        if 'tok2vec' in cfg:
+            tok2vec = cfg['tok2vec']
+        else:
+            tok2vec = Tok2Vec(token_vector_width, embed_size,
+                              pretrained_dims=pretrained_dims)
         model = (
             tok2vec
             >> with_flatten(Softmax(nr_class, token_vector_width))