The third-party dashboard, smarttiles, is very popular in the community and can work in any web browser. So you should be able to set that up on a Windows phone. It’s not quite as convenient as just a start tile, but it’s customizable and you definitely can do more with it then with the official mobile app in this regard. 
There’s even a topic in the forum where people share their ideas for customized displays and even wall-mounted hardware for smart tiles. It might give you some ideas as well.