diff --git a/docs/guides/variables-and-templating.md b/docs/guides/variables-and-templating.md
index e0a3dfbbda..7ef3dfebfc 100644
--- a/docs/guides/variables-and-templating.md
+++ b/docs/guides/variables-and-templating.md
@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ This guide introduces the templating capabilities available in Garden configurat
 
 String configuration values in `garden.yml` can be templated to inject variables, information about the user's environment, references to other modules/services and more.
 
-The syntax for templated strings is `${some.key}`. The key is looked up from the context available when resolving the string. The context depends on which top-level key the configuration value belongs to (`project` or `module`).
+The basic syntax for templated strings is `${some.key}`. The key is looked up from the context available when resolving the string. The context depends on which top-level key the configuration value belongs to (`project` or `module`).
 
 For example, for one service you might want to reference something from another module and expose it as an environment variable:
 
@@ -96,6 +96,39 @@ services:
   ...
 ```
 
+### Nested lookups and maps
+
+In addition to dot-notation for key lookups, we also support bracketed lookups, e.g. `${some["key"]}` and `${some-array[0]}`.
+
+This style offer nested template resolution, which is quite powerful, because you can use the output of one expression to choose a key in a parent expression.
+
+For example, you can declare a mapping variable for your project, and look up values by another variable such as the current environment name. To illustrate, here's an excerpt from a project config with a mapping variable:
+
+```yaml
+kind: Project
+...
+variables:
+  - replicas:
+      dev: 1
+      prod: 3
+  ...
+```
+
+And here that variable is used in a module:
+
+```yaml
+kind: Module
+type: container
+...
+services:
+  replicas: ${var.replicas["${environment.name}"]}
+  ...
+```
+
+When the nested expression is a simple key lookup like above, you can also just use the nested key directly, e.g. `${var.replicas[environment.name]}`.
+
+You can even use one variable to index another variable, e.g. `${var.a[var.b]}`.
+
 ### Optional values
 
 In some cases, you may want to provide configuration values only for certain cases, e.g. only for specific environments. By default, an error is thrown when a template string resolves to an undefined value, but you can explicitly allow that by adding a `?` after the template.
diff --git a/garden-service/src/config/config-context.ts b/garden-service/src/config/config-context.ts
index 330b381248..28c54f5e70 100644
--- a/garden-service/src/config/config-context.ts
+++ b/garden-service/src/config/config-context.ts
@@ -22,6 +22,7 @@ import { getProviderUrl, getModuleTypeUrl } from "../docs/common"
 import { Module } from "../types/module"
 import { ModuleConfig } from "./module"
 import { ModuleVersion } from "../vcs/vcs"
+import { isPrimitive } from "util"
 
 export type ContextKey = string[]
 
@@ -109,8 +110,15 @@ export abstract class ConfigContext {
       nestedNodePath = nodePath.concat(lookupPath)
       const stackEntry = nestedNodePath.join(".")
 
-      if (nextKey.startsWith("_")) {
+      if (typeof nextKey === "string" && nextKey.startsWith("_")) {
         value = undefined
+      } else if (isPrimitive(value)) {
+        throw new ConfigurationError(`Attempted to look up key ${JSON.stringify(nextKey)} on a ${typeof value}.`, {
+          value,
+          nodePath,
+          fullPath,
+          opts,
+        })
       } else {
         value = value instanceof Map ? value.get(nextKey) : value[nextKey]
       }
diff --git a/garden-service/src/template-string-parser.pegjs b/garden-service/src/template-string-parser.pegjs
index edf06835ed..a20ad98dfd 100644
--- a/garden-service/src/template-string-parser.pegjs
+++ b/garden-service/src/template-string-parser.pegjs
@@ -42,14 +42,6 @@ FormatEnd
   = __ "}?"
   / __ "}"
 
-KeySeparator
-  = "."
-
-Key
-  = head:Identifier tail:(KeySeparator Identifier)* {
-    return [["", head]].concat(tail).map(p => p[1])
-  }
-
 Prefix
   = !FormatStart (. ! FormatStart)* . { return text() }
 
@@ -58,6 +50,27 @@ Suffix
 
 // ---- expressions -----
 // Reduced and adapted from: https://github.com/pegjs/pegjs/blob/master/examples/javascript.pegjs
+MemberExpression
+  = head:Identifier
+    tail:(
+        "[" __ e:PrimaryExpression __ "]" {
+          if (e.resolved && !options.isPrimitive(e.resolved)) {
+            const _error = new options.TemplateStringError(
+              `Expression in bracket must resolve to a primitive (got ${typeof e}).`,
+              { text: e.resolved }
+            )
+            return { _error }
+          }
+          return e
+        }
+      / "." e:Identifier {
+          return e
+        }
+    )*
+    {
+      return [head].concat(tail)
+    }
+
 PrimaryExpression
   = v:NonStringLiteral {
     return v
@@ -66,7 +79,13 @@ PrimaryExpression
     // Allow nested template strings in literals
     return options.resolveNested(v)
   }
-  / key:Key {
+  / key:MemberExpression {
+    for (const part of key) {
+      if (part._error) {
+        return part
+      }
+    }
+    key = key.map((part) => part.resolved || part)
     return options.getKey(key, { allowUndefined: true })
   }
   / "(" __ e:Expression __ ")" {
@@ -215,6 +234,7 @@ IdentifierName "identifier"
   = head:IdentifierStart tail:IdentifierPart* {
       return head + tail.join("")
     }
+  / Integer
 
 IdentifierStart
   = UnicodeLetter
@@ -312,7 +332,10 @@ ExponentIndicator
   = "e"i
 
 SignedInteger
-  = [+-]? DecimalDigit+
+  = [+-]? Integer
+
+Integer
+  = DecimalDigit+
 
 HexIntegerLiteral
   = "0x"i digits:$HexDigit+ {
diff --git a/garden-service/src/template-string.ts b/garden-service/src/template-string.ts
index 875b1f7034..e6ef307f66 100644
--- a/garden-service/src/template-string.ts
+++ b/garden-service/src/template-string.ts
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ import { deepMap } from "./util/util"
 import { GardenBaseError, ConfigurationError } from "./exceptions"
 import { ConfigContext, ContextResolveOpts, ScanContext, ContextResolveOutput } from "./config/config-context"
 import { difference, flatten, uniq, isPlainObject, isNumber } from "lodash"
-import { Primitive, StringMap } from "./config/common"
+import { Primitive, StringMap, isPrimitive } from "./config/common"
 import { profile } from "./util/profiling"
 import { dedent, deline } from "./util/string"
 
@@ -66,6 +66,7 @@ export function resolveTemplateString(string: string, context: ConfigContext, op
       TemplateStringError,
       allowUndefined: opts.allowUndefined,
       optionalSuffix: "}?",
+      isPrimitive,
     })
 
     const outputs: ResolvedClause[] = parsed.map((p: any) => {
diff --git a/garden-service/test/unit/src/template-string.ts b/garden-service/test/unit/src/template-string.ts
index 7cd89313c0..cae0e09eab 100644
--- a/garden-service/test/unit/src/template-string.ts
+++ b/garden-service/test/unit/src/template-string.ts
@@ -442,6 +442,77 @@ describe("resolveTemplateString", async () => {
     expect(res).to.equal(21)
   })
 
+  it("should handle member lookup with bracket notation", async () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString("${foo['bar']}", new TestContext({ foo: { bar: true } }))
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
+  it("should handle numeric member lookup with bracket notation", async () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString("${foo[1]}", new TestContext({ foo: [false, true] }))
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
+  it("should handle consecutive member lookups with bracket notation", async () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString("${foo['bar']['baz']}", new TestContext({ foo: { bar: { baz: true } } }))
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
+  it("should handle dot member after bracket member", async () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString("${foo['bar'].baz}", new TestContext({ foo: { bar: { baz: true } } }))
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
+  it("should handle template expression within brackets", async () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString(
+      "${foo['${bar}']}",
+      new TestContext({
+        foo: { baz: true },
+        bar: "baz",
+      })
+    )
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
+  it("should handle identifiers within brackets", async () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString(
+      "${foo[bar]}",
+      new TestContext({
+        foo: { baz: true },
+        bar: "baz",
+      })
+    )
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
+  it("should handle nested identifiers within brackets", async () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString(
+      "${foo[a.b]}",
+      new TestContext({
+        foo: { baz: true },
+        a: { b: "baz" },
+      })
+    )
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
+  it("should throw if bracket expression resolves to a non-primitive", async () => {
+    return expectError(
+      () => resolveTemplateString("${foo[bar]}", new TestContext({ foo: {}, bar: {} })),
+      (err) =>
+        expect(err.message).to.equal(
+          "Invalid template string ${foo[bar]}: Expression in bracket must resolve to a primitive (got object)."
+        )
+    )
+  })
+
+  it("should throw if attempting to index a primitive with brackets", async () => {
+    return expectError(
+      () => resolveTemplateString("${foo[bar]}", new TestContext({ foo: 123, bar: "baz" })),
+      (err) =>
+        expect(err.message).to.equal('Invalid template string ${foo[bar]}: Attempted to look up key "baz" on a number.')
+    )
+  })
+
   it("should throw when using >= on non-numeric terms", async () => {
     return expectError(
       () => resolveTemplateString("${a >= b}", new TestContext({ a: 123, b: "foo" })),
@@ -485,6 +556,16 @@ describe("resolveTemplateString", async () => {
     expect(res).to.equal(true)
   })
 
+  it("should handle numeric indices on arrays", () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString("${foo.1}", new TestContext({ foo: [false, true] }))
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
+  it("should resolve keys on objects in arrays", () => {
+    const res = resolveTemplateString("${foo.1.bar}", new TestContext({ foo: [{}, { bar: true }] }))
+    expect(res).to.equal(true)
+  })
+
   it("should correctly propagate errors from nested contexts", async () => {
     await expectError(
       () => resolveTemplateString("${nested.missing}", new TestContext({ nested: new TestContext({}) })),