Building the Walter Segal Way, takes you into a minimal foundation design. Its simplicity itself, yet works as well as a strip foundation, and the steeper sites lap up the method.So whats involved, simply a paving flag sitting on the earth, with perhaps a small circular concrete pile below, the paving flag following the contour of the natural land.
The load from the timber structure loading direct onto the paving flag at its centre.
The AJ Article has this in depth, which I will send or give a link out for, if for research, and the films particularly the Grand Design film explains this in a little more detail.
The impact on the land from the house is minimal.
The video below bottom helps to understand it all, its not great and uses concrete posts rather than paving flags, but you get the basic principal, but I downloaded a sketchup file of a very good 3D Sketchup model part finished, and made the video immediately below.and the jpg to the left, I think it shows the construction better.