diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index c82038e1..49d9329f 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -10,3 +10,9 @@ zh-CN.zip
 it-IT.zip
 pocketsphinx-python/
 examples/TEST.py
+.idea
+**/.DS_Store
+**/.__pycache__
+tmp/
+tmp/*
+
diff --git a/speech_recognition/__init__.py b/speech_recognition/__init__.py
index 3e1261a4..22aadf41 100644
--- a/speech_recognition/__init__.py
+++ b/speech_recognition/__init__.py
@@ -511,6 +511,15 @@ def __init__(self):
         self.phrase_threshold = 0.3  # minimum seconds of speaking audio before we consider the speaking audio a phrase - values below this are ignored (for filtering out clicks and pops)
         self.non_speaking_duration = 0.5  # seconds of non-speaking audio to keep on both sides of the recording
 
+        self.model_path = "model"  # path to VOSK model
+
+    def add_model_path(self, model_path):
+        """ Set a path to load a speech recognition model. """
+
+        setattr(self, "model_path", model_path)
+
+        pass
+
     def record(self, source, duration=None, offset=None):
         """
         Records up to ``duration`` seconds of audio from ``source`` (an ``AudioSource`` instance) starting at ``offset`` (or at the beginning if not specified) into an ``AudioData`` instance, which it returns.
@@ -1393,12 +1402,12 @@ def recognize_vosk(self, audio_data, language='en'):
         from vosk import Model, KaldiRecognizer
         
         assert isinstance(audio_data, AudioData), "Data must be audio data"
-        
+
         if not hasattr(self, 'vosk_model'):
-            if not os.path.exists("model"):
+            if not os.path.exists(self.model_path):
                 return "Please download the model from https://github.com/alphacep/vosk-api/blob/master/doc/models.md and unpack as 'model' in the current folder."
                 exit (1)
-            self.vosk_model = Model("model")
+            self.vosk_model = Model(self.model_path)
 
         rec = KaldiRecognizer(self.vosk_model, 16000);