Garett Vassel knew he was looking at something special when he first laid eyes on the three-story, nineteenth-century brick building at the corner of Northampton Street and Larry Holmes Drive in Easton. “I knew this was what I wanted to do,” he says. “I wanted to be part of this building. I hadn’t even stepped foot inside.”
At the time, Vassel was a 32-year-old real estate developer from New York City with a new company—Optima Durant Group—and a hunger to dig into his first major project. A friend from Columbia Business School who was also working in real estate development had been exploring properties in the Bethlehem area and put the Lehigh Valley on Vassel’s radar.
Vassel bought the building in 2018. Six years later, in January of 2024, he was surrounded by Easton leaders, lawmakers and dignitaries for the official grand opening of The Commodore, a seven-story, mixed-use building with more than three dozen luxury apartments sandwiched between an upscale rooftop restaurant and specialty retail stores on the ground level. “It was very personal in the sense that I said I was going to do something, and I was determined to do it no matter what it took to do it,” says Vassel, recalling the moment.
That’s the abridged version of the story about the young man with a fresh vision for an old building. But, take the long way from point A to point B and you’ll discover a lot more twists and turns in the rise of The Commodore, one of the redevelopment projects that has helped to transform Easton’s waterfront area into a place worth the trip across the Free Bridge.
Vassel may have been in the minority when he saw great potential in what was then known as the Kaplan building, the longtime home of the Kaplan Awning business on the ground level, with living space on the upper floors. The original building went up in 1880, with an addition tacked on in 1946. “It was wildly dilapidated,” Vassel says. The residential quarters had been largely vacant for decades.
And yet, the building’s architectural flourishes spoke to him. Vassel grew up on Long Island’s North Shore, an area known as the Gold Coast for its many lavish estates tied to the wealthiest families of the early twentieth century: think Astor, Vanderbilt and Morgan. Early on, Vassel was gifted an architectural design book that featured pictures of those homes in their glory days; he’d pick out a property he wanted to see, then ask his mother to drive him there after school. “I would sit there in the back seat, and I would try to draw it,” says Vassel. “If I couldn’t do that then I would get tracing paper and I would trace over the picture. I was just fascinated that something could be so ornate and beautiful.”
Vassel studied business and communications at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. He holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Columbia Business School; in pursuit of that degree he took classes at London Business School and Beijing’s Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business. He worked in various facets of investment banking, private equity and real estate development before founding Optima Durant Group in 2017. (The name, by the way, means “the best endures” in Latin, and is the motto of the Green Vale School in Old Brookville, New York, which Vassel attended as a child.)
When he began looking around for a property to acquire in the Lehigh Valley, he was immediately drawn to Easton: “It was really captivating, I guess you would say. There’s an energy. It felt like something great was happening.” He became more resolute in his decision when he began to meet—and was welcomed by—community members and local leaders.
The first hurdle Vassel encountered in his planned redevelopment of the Kaplan building was simply trying to buy the place. When he showed up to tour the property for the first time, he was told it was already under contract. Vassel insisted on taking the tour anyway, and said he was undeterred by the workload that awaited the future developer, whoever he or she might be: “I was wildly encouraged by the opportunity. I was very moved by it.”
He then wrote what he described as a “very nice note” to the Kaplan family, who were in the process of relocating their awning business to another part of the city. That note apparently left an impression. When the first deal fell through, they reached out to Vassel. “And the rest, as they say, is history,” he says.
Little did he know what history would have in store.
Vassel planned to preserve and restore the original 1880 building; the addition built in 1946 couldn’t be saved. But, before any wrecking balls could be raised, the crippling COVID-19 pandemic that sparked supply chain disruptions around the world reared its head. The Commodore, like many development projects, was not immune to those difficulties. “It just felt like a perfect storm,” Vassel says. “It was one challenge after the next.”
Demolition finally began in May of 2021, and construction on the new, seven-story addition, adjacent to the 1880 building, got underway that following July. But then a key steel contractor went bankrupt. Construction fell behind schedule. The project’s price tag—along with inflation—kept inching up. Vassel’s plate seemed to grow a little more crowded with each passing day. “I was not part of a big team, I didn’t have a massive company or set of resources,” he says. “It was really just me.”
And so that company—and perhaps personal—motto (“the best endures”) truly came into play. “I’m as positive and optimistic of a person as it comes,” Vassel says. “I had no choice but to be positive and keep chipping away and finding solutions every day. It was a great, great challenge.”
Those many trials no doubt made the official ribbon-cutting on January 31, 2024, that much sweeter. Hundreds turned out for the event, during which Vassel was commended for his tenacity by Easton Mayor Sal Panto. Former Easton Mayor Phil Mitman presented him with an Entrepreneurial Spirit Award from the Easton Area Land Developers.
The Commodore’s first residential tenants had moved in a few months prior to the ceremony, during the fall of 2023. Thyme Rooftop Grille, offering modern cuisine and handcrafted cocktails alongside stunning views of the confluence of the Lehigh and Delaware rivers, opened its doors in December of that year. The restaurant is run by the Trapani family, who also own South Whitehall Township’s Grille 3501 and Bethlehem’s ZEST Bar & Grille.
The retail spaces on the ground floor have been scooped up by Agamon Bakery and Cafe, Clever Girl Winery, Boxology Fitness & Recovery and IRIYA Wellness & Aesthetics. While the businesses are accessible to the public, Vassel says he also considers them to be part of a larger ecosystem for the people who call The Commodore home: “We didn’t just rush to put the first lease in that we could. We have really been thoughtful to use a lot of the spaces as commercial tenants that really serve as professionally run amenities for the building.”
Vassel lives in Manhattan with his wife, Ashley Vassel, and two children, Sloan and Grey. At the time of this interview in November of 2024, he was on the hunt for his next big project. Investing in another Lehigh Valley property is a definite possibility. “I’m excited for what can be,” he says.
Published as “Insight” in the March 2025 edition of Lehigh Valley Style magazine.
