Building a stylish, professional Web site no longer requires an intimate knowledge of HTML thanks to Squarespace, the brainchild of 31-year-old tech star Anthony Casalena. Created in 2003 with a loan from his father while Casalena was still in college at the University of Maryland, the Manhattan-based Squarespace has since helped users create and host more than 1.4 million custom sites—adding up to over $17 million in revenue for the start-up last year. What has helped Squarespace stand out from its competitors is Casalena’s dedication to designing high-grade end products, which earlier this year began offering e-commerce solutions. We chatted with the admittedly minimalist Casalena about his iPhone 5.
Phone: Black iPhone 5.
Case: None.
Background: Unknown.
“I was at Frieze New York this year and really liked this work of a black-and-white star field by an artist named Ugo Rondinone. I couldn’t find a good shot of the work on Google Images, but found this instead. I’m actually not sure who it’s by.”
Last text: Girlfriend.
“She lost track of her mother—who is visiting from Germany—in SoHo. We found her after a few minutes.”
Most-used app: Squarespace Note.
“Besides e-mail, I use [it] at least five times a day. It’s an app we made that quickly lets you record your thoughts as you have them and pass those through to other places—for instance, mine pushes to my inbox. With everything I need to act on waiting in my inbox, it becomes my universal to-do list.”
Last app I used: Lutron.
“Just before I started writing this, I used the Lutron app to control the lights in my house. I have my lights and music connected to my phone at home, which is really nice.”
Currently obsessed with: Feedly.
“After Google Reader shut down, I switched over to Feedly. I spend a good part of every day catching up on news from a few hundred sources.”
Last download: Moves.
“It tracks everywhere I go and displays it in a time line. I love having a full record of the things I do during the day. It’s also really useful for remembering restaurants. I think someone I follow tweeted about it.”
Most surprising app on my home screen: Amazon.
“The fact that it’s on my home screen sadly indicates how much I order from Amazon.”
Favorite mobile game: Ridiculous Fishing.
“[It] is just amazing. I couldn’t stop playing it even after I won.”
Clean inbox? Yes.
“Completely clean. I generally have under 20 e-mails in my inbox at any given time. I’m constantly archiving items I don’t need to act upon. If there’s something in my inbox that I don’t need to address for a while, I’ll archive it and make a note on a long term to-do list in Evernote.”
Text or call? Text.
“Text. I hate calling, and I really hate voicemail. Please don’t leave me a voicemail.”
Remaining battery: 100 percent.
“I try and recharge at work. I usually don’t run out of battery despite the GPS-hogging apps.”