The paper deals with the modelling of the relaxation processes towards thermodynamical equilibrium in a liquid-vapour isothermal mixture. Focusing on the van der Waals equation of state, we construct an constrained optimization problem using Gibbs' formalism and characterize all possible equilibria: coexistence states, pure phases and metastable states. Coupling with time evolution, we develop a dynamical system whose equilibria coincide with the minimizers of the optimization problem. Eventually we consider the coupling with hydrodynamics and use the dynamical system as a relaxation source terms in an Euler-type system. Numerical results illustrate the ability of the whole model to depict coexistence and metastable states as well.